


The Vermillion Bird and the Lotus

by Impetuous_Archipelago



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, BAMF Jongdae, BAMF Yixing, Betrayal, Blood Magic, Blood Play, Blood and Violence, Bottom Kim Jongdae | Chen, Chinese Mythology & Folklore, EXO-M - Freeform, Fuck Or Die, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Music Video: Lit (Zhang Yi Xing | Lay), References to Drugs, Top Zhang Yi Xing | Lay, a hint of, but not really, but probably not in the way you're thinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:21:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26525152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Impetuous_Archipelago/pseuds/Impetuous_Archipelago
Summary: “Oh gods…."“I know,” Baekhyun shuddered. “He’s scary as fuck.”“He’s gorgeous…” Yixing breathed.Baekhyun followed Yixing’s gaze, and to his credit, he seemed to be attempting to indulge his friend’s sudden infatuation with the pretty Berserker.“Alright, I guess he’s kind of hot. Like… if you ever have the urge to be fucked by a dagger…”OR: After an unfortunate incident, Prince Yixing takes over Jongdae's little crew of Berserkers, and Jongdae is NOT happy.
Relationships: Kim Jongdae | Chen/Zhang Yi Xing | Lay
Comments: 24
Kudos: 120
Collections: Shall we Chen? Fictional Fest First Round





	The Vermillion Bird and the Lotus

**Author's Note:**

> This is a work of fiction based heavily but entirely inaccurately on some aspects of Chinese mythology and the story of Xian Yu and his beloved Consort. If you see massive references to Yixing’s amazing ‘Lit’ video, well… you’re not wrong…
> 
> Dear prompter, thank you so so much for this prompt! I saw it and I had to write something. I had to rush this fic a bit at the end, but I hope that you nonetheless enjoy this little tale about the Vermillion Bird and the Lotus. 
> 
> I'd also like to thank my lovely beta reader Uxía Luaña! Thank you so much for your input and your encouragement! 
> 
> Prompt code: #SWC199
> 
> Prompt: The war is harsh. The war is bloody. And the war is hard. It is already so hard and the last thing Jongdae wants is a new commander whose ideals and approach to the situation differ so greatly from Jongdae's own.
> 
> Please note: This is a story about war, and the characters have powers based on blood manipulation (a little bit like blood-bending from ATLA), so if that skeeves you out, please be cautious! There is also some mention of drugs and addiction, although this really doesn’t pertain to the main characters and is mostly mentioned abstractly. Please read the tags carefully and look after yourselves! 
> 
> PS: most of this story is Yixing-centric, but his thoughts largely revolve around Jongdae, so…

**The Vermillion Bird and the Lotus**

  
  


The gate shattered open. Yixing could hear the thundering of soldiers’ boots, the clanging of their spears. He knew if he turned, he would see them flooding the pavilion.

The sounds melted into a single thrashing roar, but for one– a lilting tune that seared over everything, flaying him more than a blade ever could. They were singing the song of his hometown. It echoed in his ears. They were mocking him.

He had sent his best soldier to fight them, and they returned like this.

Singing his songs, parading his lover’s body on a plank across their shoulders.

A horde of ants wielding a fallen phoenix.

Dimly, he wished he’d had the luxury of doubt. But he felt it.

His vermillion bird was dead.

The blood that used to thrill under Yixing’s touch was now still in Jongdae’s veins. The skin that Yixing used to coax into a million blushes was now the white hard of marble. No, not white.

Grey.

All the life was gone.

He had promised Jongdae eternity. He had promised that they would rebuild this broken world together. Instead, he had watched them take Jongdae’s body and throw it into the Palace well.

In the thin mist of the new morning, Yixing knew it was over. The dragon had abandoned them.

The Azure Palace had fallen.

He had lost everything for nothing.

Slowly, Yixing raised his head. He turned to face his enemy. They brandished their flag proudly, as if their symbols meant anything but the lowest betrayal. There must be at least five hundred, he thought, bemused. Five hundred to take down one. He watched distantly as they trained their spears upon his body, feeling nothing but pinpricks even where the metal pierced his skin. Defying his wishes, his skin healed over the wounds, knitting itself back together every time he exhaled, only to be pierced again upon his inhale.

As if his enemy hadn’t already flayed him open on the inside. 

Somewhere deep inside himself, he was laughing. They had taken everything he lived for, and they had still sent half a battalion to make sure he died.

He had nothing left to do now,  _ but _ die.

And he would take all of them with him.

That fucking song.

He hated it.

He drew his sword.

The Vermillion Bird and the Dragon would be together. Even in death.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

  
  


“This world was born in blood, it is made of blood, and it will die in blood.”

As Yixing set foot in the Azure Palace for the first time in years, he remembered the story his mother used to tell him every night. His power thrummed in his veins as his mother’s voice reminded him of his purpose– the reason he came back.

In the beginning, four gods raged against each other, each vying for destiny of the universe; Black Tortoise, White Tiger, Vermillion Bird and Azure Dragon.    
  
They warred for millennia, each too stubborn to compromise, all too powerful to lose.

They warred until the universe itself threatened to shatter beneath their wrath.   
  
They warred until, one day, a young woman stole their powers.    
  
This was the First Empress.   
  
The First Empress knew she would not be able to hold the gods’ powers within herself for long. Before the powers returned to their sacred owners, she set about creating the world:   
  
Azure Dragon made the sky, White Tiger the ground.

Black Tortoise made water and the shadows, and Vermillion Bird made fire and the light.   
  


The First Empress then shackled the deities to the four corners of the earth she had just created, housing them in great temples beneath the soil.

When this was done, she went to the banks of the Great River. Taking the wet clay of the earth, she divided it into four. Into each clump, she mixed the blood of the gods.    
  
She shaped each clump into hundreds of little figures. With the gods’ sacred blood in their veins and her love in their spirits, the little clay figures came to life. 

These were the children of the gods. 

The humans. 

But, in her hurry to complete this task before her powers faded, the First Empress hadn’t properly measured out how much blood she had put into each clay figure. In her haste, she had mixed too much of the gods’ blood into some of the figures.

The children who bore this excess were born with the blood gift– the power to manipulate the properties of another’s blood.

  
Thus, each God Clan came to have its own bloodgifted children, all of whom came to bear the traits of their god:

The Black Tortoise’s children were slow, resistant to change, but vastly intelligent. Its bloodgifted were granted soporific powers– the ability to numb others’ sensations, induce hallucinations, trick the senses into forgetting themselves. The Empress granted them the north.

The White Tiger’s children were fierce but reclusive warriors. Their bloodgift could alter the properties of blood, thickening it, thinning it, depriving it of air. They could locate blood over vast distances, making them excellent hunters, deadly predators. The Empress gave them the west.

The Vermillion Bird’s children were full of passion, but also impatient and impetuous. Those who were granted its bloodgift had control over the nerves of the body, manipulating the sparks of electricity that governed feeling and action. The Empress gave them the land of the Sun: east.

The Azure Dragon’s children were most noble and wise of them all, but prone to arrogance. Its bloodgift children possessed the power to heal. To be granted the power of life instead of death- perhaps this made them the most powerful of them all. The Empress granted them the fertile south. 

As her powers faded, the First Empress foolishly granted the gods one final wish. At the end of each millennia, one god would be released to roam the universe, for a single day. Tortoise, Tiger, Bird or Dragon– this would be determined entirely by the power of their children at the turn of the millennia.   
  
So, where the gods could no longer war with each other, their children warred instead.

At the time Yixing returns to the Azure Palace, the millennial is fast approaching.

At this moment in time, the Black Tortoise’s children are nearly extinct.

The White Tiger’s children live in seclusion in the deserts of the west.

The Vermillion and Azure Empires slaughter each other, waging a war that has seemed to be without end.

But soon things  _ will _ end.

Yixing has returned to the Azure Palace to secure his family’s victory.

The Azure Dragon will roam the earth again.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

It had been a long time since he’d been to the front.

It had been a long time since he’d been home.

Yixing didn’t know how to feel about that.

On the one hand, he hadn’t realized how much he’d missed the Azure Palace. He’d been shipped off to train in Elyxion long before the Vermillion Empire had come practically knocking at the Azure Palace’s door. By the time he’d been promoted to General, they’d wanted to keep the crown princes as far away from the battle front as possible. A moronic idea, Yixing thought, to arm the princes the best military training available, only to keep them from the fight.

But tragedy had afforded Yixing a chance.

In the aftermath of disaster (and a high bar it was indeed, these days, to name  _ anything _ a disaster) Yixing had insisted.

And now he was here.

Junmyeon was the true successor to the throne anyway. Junmyeon would stay safe, as far away from the physical fight as possible. Not because anyone was worried he couldn’t handle himself. Junmeyon was deadly in his own right. But he had been born for the intrigues of the War Room and he was far more useful there than anywhere else.

If Junmyeon hadn’t been his brother, and if Yixing didn’t have years behind him to know Junmyeon to be a staunch pillar of justice and wisdom, he would have thought Junmyeon was a psychopath. Junmyeon had an uncanny ability to identify an enemy’s weakness and exploit it until he left his foe writhing on the ground. Metaphorically speaking. 

Junmyeon was a master of the psychological and every time he got a chance to wage war against an enemy’s ego, he won against their might. Every time.

It was just a pity that they hamstringed him all the time. Court politics was stifling, and next-in-line though he was, Junmyeon was no match for the entrenched power of all their numerous uncles whose potbellies jealously protected the old guard, no matter what it cost them.

But Yixing was going to change that. With a right-hand man at the front, Junmyeon would finally have some sway in this war that was drowning them in their own blood as much as their enemies’.

Of course, Yixing would have loved to have been transferred under more auspicious circumstances.

It was Junmyeon who suggested to the old Admirals that Yixing could take charge of the Berserkers. That way, the Azure Army could keep their elite force, and also reel it back into the ambit of the Crown. And, Yixing’s name would protect the Berserkers from further scrutiny. Hopefully.

“Long time no see, gege!”

Baekhyun’s voice cut straight through his haze of nostalgia and trepidation.

“Baek!” Yixing folded Baekhyun into his arms, holding on tight. It had been a long time since he’d seen his best friend.

Yixing and Baekhyun were both affectionate people, and it was some time before Yixing drew back, his hands still resting on Baekhyun’s shoulders. Despite the drabness of Imperial Messenger uniforms, Baekhyun still managed to look beautiful in the mud-brown of his robes. Yixing tried to tamp down his relief that his friend still held the same wiry energy in his muscles, the same mischievous mirth in his eyes. The war hadn’t taken those away yet. Thank the gods.

“So, you got put in charge of the mutts, huh?” Baekhyun said, when they finally separated, both pretending not to notice each other’s tears. Baekhyun was eyeing Yixing with something akin to sympathy, as if Yixing hadn’t fought tooth and nail for this posting.

Yixing shrugged. “They needed Imperial blood to control the Berserkers. I was available.”

Baekhyun snorted.

“How bad could they be?” These were always infamous words, but Yixing was genuinely curious.

“Ordinarily, I wouldn’t put any weight to the rumours, but if you met them, you’d understand,” Baekhyun began leading Yixing through the corridors of the Palace.

Of course, there was no time. He had to meet his new troops right away.

“I was a bit startled when I read their records,” Yixing admitted as they walked, hand in hand.

The Berserkers were infamous. The number of poems sung about them in the countryside rivalled the number of tunes devoted to the Imperial family itself. But when Yixing read their actual military records, it was enough to make his blood squirm. It didn’t look like heroics on paper. It looked like savagery.

They were ruthless.

Again, a lofty standard to meet at a time of war.

The Berserkers were all bastards– all the results of unsanctioned unions between Azure Dragon subjects and a variety of foreigners. It was funny. Mixed race offspring made excellent ambassadors and political tools if it was royal blood that flowed through their veins. But without that sanguinary stamp of approval, it seemed mixed blood had just about as much worth as the mud that still squelched on the banks of the Great River.

Privileged mixed offspring were tools. Poor mixed offspring were an aberration of Azure purity.

Mutts.

And mutts were shunned from society.

Unless, of course, they were a Berserker.

Then they were still shunned, but at least on their terms.

“If you weren’t my oldest best friend, I wouldn’t have agreed to this,” Baekhyun complained as he led Yixing towards the Plum Courtyard in the west wing of the Palace. At the back of his mind, Yixing noted everything; the antiques room where he, Chanyeol, Baekhyun and Junmyeon used to play a particularly fiscally dangerous game of hide and seek (now raided of all antiques), the library where they had all first learnt to read and write (now stripped of books), the corridor that led to the family quarters where Yixing used to spend those precious, rare as diamonds moments with his mother (now adapted to his soldiers’ barracks).

A particular staircase caught his eye.

“How is the pool?” Yixing asked quietly.

Baekhyun cast him a quick look. “It’s been cleaned and now it’s being left alone. Everyone is anticipating the arrival of the Dragon at the Millenial. No one wants to disturb it until then. But obviously it’s different for you. Now that you’re here, you’re welcome to go whenever you want, of course.”

“The elders won’t mind?”

“Who cares?” Baekhyun said, flippant as always. “You’re the Dragon’s direct bloodline. If you can’t decide when you want to go to the pool, who can?”

Yixing chuckled. “I’ll think about that later. Tell me, Baek. What am I getting myself into?”

Baekhyun eyed Yixing. Abruptly, he switched direction, dragging Yixing into one of the old Discussion rooms. It had been converted into an armory now.

“Here, look,” Baekhyun pulled Yixing over to the window that was covered by a patterned wooden grill, designed specifically so that one could see out, but those who were out could not see  _ in _ .

Yixing sensed the four men languishing in the shade of the Courtyard’s plum tree before he saw them. Even from their blood, Yixing could tell there was something uncanny about them.

“Their blood doesn’t feel right, does it?” Baekhyun said knowingly.

“It’s not…wrong,” Yixing hesitated. “I just haven’t felt anything like it before.”

There was one person especially whose blood was sending a prickle along his own senses. Yixing had never felt something so… restless. He followed the feeling until his gaze fell upon one particular soldier.

At the centre of the group, leaning against the plum tree, was the most arrestingly beautiful man Yixing had ever seen. This had to be the leader of the Berserkers himself. Jongdae.

The angles of his features were cut sharply into his face; knife’s-edge cheekbones; brush-stroke eyebrows that seemed to arch upwards in expression; a perfect archer’s bow set of lips. The bones of his face seemed to press up against the skin, giving him the impression of being simultaneously as fragile as a bird and as deadly a scorpion. His raven’s hair was shaved close at the sides, as was standard for all members of the Azure army. The rest of its length, however, had been styled into a distinct dragon’s braid down the centre of his head. Whether this was to overtly demonstrate his allegiance or to mock it, Yixing couldn’t be sure. Jongdae’s languid posture screamed of danger, as if any moment his muscles would ripple into action, and by then it would be too late.

Yixing wanted to see him move.

Idly, Yixing noted that Jongadae’s suit uniform was just standard issue grey. No ribbons, no headdresses. No embellishments that would adorn any other Captain of a squadron that had managed to achieve as much as the Berserkers had in the short time they’d been active.

The only ostentation Jongdae had was the twisted dagger that twirled restlessly between his fingers.

The spinning blade stilled.

Jongdae’s head tilted, as if sensing something.

Baekhyun and Yixing froze as Jongdae’s eyes seemed to find them even through the window screen. As if he knew of their scrutiny.

Fuck. Those eyes.

Beside him, Yixing heard Baekhyun gulp.

That inkwell gaze remained trained on them for a good moment, despite the fact that Yixing was absolutely positive that Jongdae couldn’t see them. At this distance, Jongdae shouldn’t be able to sense them either.

Still, he watched.

Yixing held his breath.

Fuck. The Palace calligrapher couldn’t have done a better job than that face.

Finally, the eyes turned away.

Jongdae’s gaze turned back to his motley soldier-mates, something like playful mischief returning to his eyes as he regarded them (they were currently attempting to juggle several bladed weapons between them). Rather than attempt to join the game, he kept his own dagger still. He rested its tip against the swell of his lower lip, deep in thought.

“Oh gods…”

“I know,” Baekhyun shuddered. “He’s scary as fuck.”

“He’s gorgeous…” Yixing breathed.

Baekhyun followed Yixing’s gaze, and to his credit, he seemed to be attempting to indulge his friend’s sudden infatuation with the pretty Berserker.

“Alright, I guess he’s kind of hot. Like… if you ever have the urge to be fucked by a dagger…”

Yixing arched an eyebrow at him. Baekhyun shrugged.

“Tell me about them,” Yixing shook out the muscles that had frozen under Jongdae’s gaze, watching the group carefully though the tessellated shapes of the window grate.

“Haven’t you already read all the reports?”

“I have,” Yixing agreed. “But I want to hear it from someone on the ground.”

Baekhyun seemed to understand this reasoning.

He pointed to Jongdae.

“As you know, your lover there is the leader of this scary little group. Jongdae. The Berserker himself. His childhood settlement is practically inside the border between us and the Vermillion Empire at this point. He’s the son of some petty tribesman- gave him up pretty much the second he was born. Where Jongdae went after that is anybody’s guess. But it wasn’t long before they found him in the thick of the fighting. He was sixteen, I think, when they caught him stealing supplies from an army camp. Heard he put up an impressive fight. They would have killed him, but General Kibum said he thought Jongdae could be useful. And, whatever else people say, Jongdae is useful,” Baekhyun admitted. “Maybe too useful. He practically decimated the enemy force on their first skirmish. He could have been General by now, but he doesn’t get along well with others.”

Jongdae seemed to be getting along just fine with his peers. The other three were currently attempting to clap various rhythms in the midst of tossing their daggers back and forth between them. The blades spun in the air. Not one catch was dropped, and not one drop was spilt.

“Oh he gets on fine with them,” Baekhyun seemed to know what Yixing was thinking. “I was talking about the other soldiers. The… regular ones. It doesn’t matter how talented he is– they hate him. The other soldiers won’t take orders from a mutt, you know that. Not to mention that he is incapable of following orders.”

“So they gave him his own squadron?”

“His very own band of mutts,” Baekhyun agreed.

“All of them are mixed blood?”

Baekhyun nodded. “Yes. But they’re all different strains- a real cocktail of blood types.”

Baekhyun directed Yixing’s gaze to a tall, lanky man whose good looks were either enhanced or diminished (depending on who you talked to, Yixing supposed) by the brooding expression that seemed etched into his face.

“That’s Yifan. Don’t mess with him,” Baekhyun said. “Yifan will make your blood feel like molasses in your veins and he can disrupt any healing.”

“He’s the White Tiger mix?”

Baekhyun nodded. “He’s a strong fighter– he didn’t skip the White Tiger genetics on that one. But he can also do serious damage to an enemy troop’s stamina. And he looks scary as fuck.”

“You think all of them look scary as fuck.”

“Agreed.” Baekhyun pointed to another member of the Berserker Force with as much discretion as Yixing supposed he was capable of. “You see the tiny devil one? The one who looks like a sweet little deer?”

What an oddly specific description.

“That’s Luhan. He’s a hellion. Nobody actually knows what he’s mixed with. If you do the test on him, he’s actually full-blooded Azure Dragon. No mutt blood at all.”

“But he was accepted into the Berserkers?”

“All I know is that he should have the exact same powers as you or I. But he doesn’t.”

“I read that he can heal?”

“Okay he does. But there’s something really… wrong… about his healing abilities,” Baekhyun said slowly. “They say that when he heals someone, they seem fine for a bit. And then they start dying, like the healing meant nothing. And it’s a slow death, too. It’s like he doesn’t heal them- he just ekes out their death. They also say that if he really, truly hates a man, he doesn’t kill them– he hurts them and then he heals them. Then he lets them out in the countryside to die on their own.”

Yixing found it hard to believe of the innocent looking man sitting at Jongdae’s feet.

“Also, he’s their best combat fighter. He’s fast as hell, has mad skills with a sword. I’d say he could even be a match for you,” Baekhyun said, as if challenging Yixing.

Yixing ignored the bait.

“And the man in the back? The one with the hood up?”

“That’s Minseok.”

“He looks innocent enough.” Yixing caught sight of a startlingly youthful looking face. Were half the Berserkers drinking from some unknown fountain of youth?

“He’s the worst one,” Baekhyun breathed. “He’s got Black Tortoise blood in him.”

“I thought that the Black Tortoise tribe was extinct.”

“I thought so too,” Baekhyun said. “But there’s no mistaking it. You’re familiar with what the signature Black Tortoise powers are?”

“They have a narcotic effect on the blood,” Yixing said, eyeing the man with renewed interest. “They can induce hallucinations, night terrors, the like.”

Closer inspection and the turning of Minseok revealed a tattoo that covered half the Berserker’s face. Its pattern was incomprehensible at this distance, but the youthful purity of his face was immediately quashed.

“He can do all that.” Baekhyun said, lowering his voice even further. “They say he has the power of endless sleep. He puts his enemies in a coma, just like that. They’re standing up one second, the next they’re done. Not even dead. Just… there…”

Yixing shuddered despite himself.

“Yeah,” Baekhyun agreed. “The only silver lining is that they almost never use him. His powers apparently take a massive toll on him. Dragon blood and Tortoise blood don’t mix very well. They say a new tattoo appears on his body every time he uses his power. They don’t know what will happen to him once he’s covered in them.”

“What about Jongdae?” Yixing’s gaze needed no excuse to return to the striking man with the dagger. “What mix is he?”

Baekhyun chuckled. “The troops on both sides hate him most. What mix do you think he is?”

“Vermillion blood.”

“Yup,” Baekhyun remarked casually. “Blood of the enemy.”

“Do they know why he chose us? Instead of them?”

“His mother is Azure Dragon, apparently. He was raised by her. I guess he wanted revenge against the daddy that didn’t want him.”

Yixing never wanted to hear Baekhyun say daddy ever again.

“The Vermillion and Dragon blood don’t combat each other?”

“The opposite,” Baekhyun said. “They don’t seem to have mixed at all.”

“What?”

“He has both powers. Distinctly. He can heal, and he can manipulate the nervous system. If he can combine the two, I wouldn’t know it. He is… insane on the battlefield. I saw him fight once. He can take down an entire battalion on his own, after first blood.”

“And the dagger?”

It was unusual to see anyone with the bloodgift wield something as ineffectual as a dagger on a battlefield. In order to use the bloodgift, the target had to have an open wound. Much of their fighting was simply to draw first blood, just so the bloodgifted could  _ use _ their powers at all.   
  
Bloodgifted preferred longswords for precisely this reason. Longswords allowed one to draw first blood while remaining as far from the enemy as possible so they couldn’t do the same.    
Longswords were built for impersonal chaos of war.    
  
Daggers were so much more intimate. 

“Maybe he doesn’t know how to use a sword?” Baekhyun offered. “It’s not like he needs it. He’s pretty damn good with that little dagger of his. Usually Luhan and Yifan do the initial dirty work until he steps in. They draw the first blood. And once the Berserkers have access to the enemies’ bloodstream, it’s over.”

Baekhyun grinned.

“And now, this band of crazy, possibly psychopathic people is under your command.”   
  


  
  
❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

  
  
  


Jongdae hated him already.

The Lotus of the Dragon Empire, they called him. He was born on sheets of silk and handed toys of ivory, every obstacle in life slid out of his way like paper doors with a muttered ‘let me, your Majesty’. Wealth was so inconsequential to him that it had more value as an adornment on his person than it did as currency. Why would he need to buy what he owned already?

Jongdae could feel him watching through the window. The flow of royal blood was unmistakable.

Jongdae might have sympathized, really. They were both bastards, born out of their fathers’ petty love affairs rather than their ‘rightful’ unions. Both of their mothers had probably hoped that their father’s blood would afford them certain privileges in life. But Jongdae’s mother had been wrong and The Lotus’ had been right. It was no secret that the Lotus Concubine was the old Emperor’s favourite. And The Lotus had been born with everything.

Jongdae had built the Berserkers with his own blood, literally and metaphorically. Their failures might be their own, but so were their successes. Unorthodox though they were, Jongdae knew that they had earned every scrap of power, every throwaway nod of respect, every mild surge of good-feeling from the townspeople, even when the victory went uncredited.

And all that blood had been worth nothing.

Jongdae had given up his soul to form the Berserkers, to make it so that no one could touch them, to protect them from everyone, including themselves. The pillars of this safe haven were carved from his bones, its walls from any peace he could have hoped to have.

Zhang Yixing had simply rolled out of one bed one day, and now he would take Jongdae’s place.

Jongdae  _ hated  _ it.

“What do you think the Prince will have us do first?” Luhan said glibly, throwing Minseok’s dagger back at him. “Calisthenics? Will he lecture us about our duty?  _ Oh! _ Will he tell us all about how mutts are a blight upon the honour of the Empire?”

“Calisthenics would be nice,” Minseok admitted quietly. “I’ve been feeling a little sluggish lately.”

“You’re always sluggish.” Yifan managed to catch the dagger an inch before it could pierce his grin. He proceeded to use it as a toothpick.

“I wonder if he’s hot?” Luhan continued his musings, adding his second knife to the game. “Because the last idiot stationed here could have fed his entire troop with that potbelly.”

“I wish I had a potbelly,” Minseok remarked sadly.

“That’s the dream,” Luhan agreed.

“We’ll make it happen one day, Minseok ge-ge,” Jongdae assured him. “You deserve it.”

“What about me?” Luhan asked, affronted.

“Your proportions aren’t right, you’d look like a spinning top,” Jongdae said. “You’re better off a little hungry.”

Luhan smirked, looking a little hungry at Jongdae.

Jongdae snorted. “Alright people, they’re about to make their grand entrance, try to present yourselves appropriately.”

Yifan made sure to make his slouch more pronounced, Minseok pulled his hood down even further over his face and Luhan sent his dagger sailing right at Byun Baekhyun’s feet. It vibrated as it stabbed into the ground not two inches from Byun’s big toe.

Baekhyun shrieked. “What the fuck!? You can’t kill the messenger!”

“A dagger to the toe would hardly kill you,” Luhan pointed out.

“You could have maimed me,” Baekhyun gasped.

“You mean, improved.”

“Bastard!”

“Being a bastard is rather the point of our little group, Byun,” Luhan remarked.

Jongdae ignored the general screeching in favour of sizing up his new commander.

“He  _ is _ hot.” Minseok commented in Jongdae’s ear.

Jongdae tilted his head appraisingly. Commander Zhang was indeed hot in a classic, obvious sort of way. Unlike the other royals who had tried to leash their team, Zhang’s muscles weren’t pouring off him in rolls of smug fat. He was lean, the veins of his hands indicated that actual work had crafted the lithe body and hardened lines that peeked out from the ‘v’ of his uniform’s collar. But that didn’t change the fact that most royalty were either corrupt deviants or hopelessly insipid. Commander Zhang’s body might be fit, but there were dreams in his eyes. He was soft.

Jongdae’s wrist flicked.

Silver licked through the air.

A millisecond before the blade could slice off his ear, commander Zhang caught it. Not one muscle in his face twitched. His blood didn’t react either. His nerves only fired to catch the dagger.

His eyes still dreamed.

Interesting.

“What the fuck?!” Baekhyun screeched, louder now.

“My apologies, your majesty,” Jongdae peeled himself off the plum tree, sauntering forward. “I’ve heard that royal Azure blood can regenerate body parts,” he said. “I just wanted to see if it was true.”

“And if it wasn’t?!”

“Purely aesthetic wound,” Jongdae dismissed. “His majesty’s hearing wouldn’t have even been affected. Though maybe it would have done something for his current state of muteness. But…”

Jongdae spread his arms, inviting Zhang to take advantage of his unarmed state. “If my Prince wants to reprimand me, he’s welcome to try.”

Such snark was borderline treason, but Zhang just blinked at him. The contours of his face didn’t change. Instead, he walked forward calmly. When he was a foot from Jongdae, he held out his hand, indicating for Jongdae to outstretch his.

Jongdae refused to hesitate. He held out his palm.

Zhang placed the hilt of the dagger into his palm and curled Jongdae’s fingers around it.

“You should hold onto that,” Zhang patted Jongdae’s fingers amiably. He stepped back and walked around Jongdae.

“Good afternoon, soldiers,” Zhang said pleasantly. “It’s an honour to be chosen as your Commander. I know this is a bit of a change for you, as you already have a commander to whom you are loyal. Rightfully so. I know Captain Jongdae has led all of you since your inception, and that he has led you well.”

Interesting how Zhang reinforced Jongdae’s position and also announced his demotion in the same sentence.

“It is just an unfortunate state of affairs that you burnt down that one orphanage,” Zhang turned to catch Jongdae’s eye. “Command usually wouldn’t care, but it was one of our own orphanages, so they took notice.”

Jongdae shrugged. He knew what the reports said. That he had gone truly mad and had bombed one of their own orphanages near the border.

It was true.

He had.

He wasn’t sorry.

“Think of it as collateral damage for our excellence,” he batted his eyelashes at Zhang.

Zhang smiled. “Then think of my command as collateral for the same.”

Jongdae would kill him. Luhan snorted.

Zhang turned back to  _ Jongdae’s  _ soldiers.

“I’m sure I could talk until moonrise and not convince you of anything,” he said. “So I will not waste my words beyond the essential. Firstly, I am glad to be your Commander. Secondly, I hope you will give me a chance to gain your respect. And finally, we set out at midnight. Be ready or save us all some time and court martial yourselves. I hope I’ll see you here when the night is at its darkest.”

“Oh, and,” Zhang paused midway to the exit. “While we are working together, I am not your Prince or your majesty. Call me Commander Yixing.”

With that, Yixing swept from the courtyard, allowing the perfume of lotus and Jongdae’s seething resentment to linger in his wake.

Baekhyun beamed. “This is going to be so much fun.”

  
  


❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

  
  


The night was truly at its darkest.

“Why are we literally inside the mountain’s asshole? It stinks of bird-shit in here.”

Yifan was always so eloquent.

“Ask your Commander,” Jongdae said, with far more pettiness than he would have liked to admit himself capable of. Jongdae didn’t know that having them walk single file through what appeared to be the local fauna’s toilet was the best way to go about it, but he wasn’t Commander anymore.

They were creeping single-file through a narrow tunnel that burrowed its way straight to the front. Jongdae would never have confined them to it, especially Minseok, but Zhang wanted to see what his new troops were made of.

If they didn’t let Minseok out into the fresh air soon, he would definitely find out.

Luhan had already sliced a cut into both his and Minseok’s palms and was desperately clutching onto Minseok’s hand, trying to slow the effect of claustrophobia on the elder’s blood pressure before it spiked and all of them just keeled over in comas, right there.

“Why are we doing this again?”

“Because, Luhan, if we give the Vermillion troops time to realise that we have Prince Yixing with us by taking the long route to the front, they will redirect all of their energy at us and we will be pulverized before you even get a chance to throw out a snarky comment.” Baekhyun said.

“Surely I don’t need to point out the solution to that?” Jongdae retorted from the back of the line.

“You can just–”

“Guys, shut up,” Minseok gritted. “ _ Please _ .”

They fell silent again.

It was strange that Jongdae had never heard of this tunnel before. Jongdae thought he’d known anything and this area of the Azure Empire– he’d never been anywhere else but this south-west corner, after all– but he hadn’t known about this tunnel.

“It is a family secret,” Yixing had said unabashedly as he’d led them down the steps that led to the Dragon’s Lair. “Take it as a show of good faith, and my trust in you.”

Jongdae didn’t know what to make of that.

Instead of taking them to where the Dragon supposedly slept until it would emerge for the new year, Yixing took them further.

Jongdae hadn’t been aware that there was a further.

And ‘further’ wasn’t just one tunnel. It was a labyrinth. Jongdae had no idea where any of the branches went, and none of them were marked.

What more were the Royals hiding?

Nonetheless, Commander Zhang was leading them through the pitch-black maze like a scent dog. Jongdae would pity an actual scent dog trying to navigate its way through what was obviously the local fauna’s communal toilet, but since the Commander had chosen this, and since he was an asshole (the ‘he’ here could refer to either Jongdae or Zhang, Jongdae thought, and it would be equally true), and since they were literally in the shit together, Jongdae was happy to curse him out in his head.

Until they reached the end of the tunnel and saw their destination.

Then Jongdae cursed him out loud.

“You fucker.”

They were at Exordium.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Exordium is the opening or introductory part of a discourse or treatise.

It is also the name of the most volatile front of the war between the Azure and Vermillion Empires. The higher-ups on both sides of the border thought they were being very funny when they named the front after the introduction to a verbal or written argument.

An interesting anecdote, or provocative statement that orients the viewer in the argument. A cute little introduction to a war that was bleeding thousands.

The few troops who got the joke were less than amused.

“You fucker.”

Yixing deserved that.

“You brought us to the heart of the fighting!” Jongdae hissed. “You know we’re not allowed to be here!”

“No,” Yixing corrected. “You  _ weren’t _ allowed to be here, Jongdae. Now the Berserkers are under my command. And I’m allowed to be here because, unlike yourself, it doesn’t matter which parent I choose to be loyal to today– both are of Azure blood.”

Yixing admired Jongdae’s restraint in not hitting him. Had the situation been reversed, Yixing wasn’t sure he’d exhibit the same composure.

Yifan intervened tactfully. “Commander, what’s our plan? We’ve never been in the all-out fight before– we’re usually used for skirmishes and tactical operations.”

“This is a tactical operation,” Yixing replied. “I need to get to that building.”

He pointed to one of the local structures thankfully several hundred feet  _ away  _ from the main fighting.

On the other side of it.

The Vermillion Warfront Headquarters.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

“This is my cue to leave,” Baekhyun announced, sounding most relieved about this. “This humble messenger will await your return further down the tunnel. Try not to take too long.”

As Baekhyun slithered back into the depths of the mountain, Jongdae rounded on Yixing.

“What the hell are you doing?” Jongdae hissed. “Your first mission with us, and you expect us to fucking take down the entire Vermillion battlefront?”

“I don’t expect any such thing,” Yixing said. “I only expect you to get me to that building. Point A to point B. I don’t think that’s beneath what your men can accomplish. Now, if you’ll stand back, soldier.”

Jongdae seethed as Yixing squeezed past him. They were still standing in the mouth of the cave, which was wider than the rest of the tunnel, but still small enough for Minseok to retain his greenish palour.

“Luhan, Yifan,” Yixing called them. “You’re up.”

“What?” Yifan’s jaw dropped open dumbly.

“What’s the plan here, boss man?” Luhan cast Jongdae a quick glance before turning back to Yixing. “Are you going to tell us what we’re supposed to do?”

Yixing shrugged. “I told you. Point A to Point B. I need a path through the fighting. Make it happen.”

Luhan cocked his head. “And?”

“And nothing,” Yixing smiled vaguely. “You’re free to do whatever you want. Just. Point A. Point B. No holds barred.”

Even Jongdae was worried about how gleeful Luhan looked.

“I think I may be able to like you, boss man,” Luhan grinned. “Yifan, let’s go!”

Jongdae nearly pulled blood from his tongue with how hard he was trying not to call them back. Trying not to interfere with Yixing’s command.

“You’re of royal blood– you don’t even need first blood for your powers to work!” Jongdae hissed at Yixing instead. “Why aren’t you out there with them!”

“It’s not my abilities that are up for judgement here,” Yixing said evenly.

Jongdae watched Yifan and Luhan throw themselves into the fray, their all-black uniforms disappearing them into their foes. Already, the Vermillion soldiers around them were slowing down, drooping under Yifan’s influence and fleeing away from Luhan’s.

“If you think that you can make my men your cannon fodder, I will fucking gut you,” Jongdae snarled. “I am not afraid of you, Commander Zhang.”

“Nor I of you, Jongdae,” Yixing replied. “Now stand down, soldier, before I make you.”

“ _ Jongdae! _ ” Minseok gasped.

Immediately, Jongdae ran to the eldest’s side, holding up the wilting Berserker. “It’s okay, hyung, I got you.”

Jongdae reached for Minseok’s palm, already opening up the channels of his Azure powers, readying himself for the cooling sensation of healing.

“No.”

Jongdae found his powers being cut off. Yixing pulled him back.

“What?”

“No healing,” Yixing said. “Minseok, you’re up. Get out there.”

“What?!” Jongdae was going to kill him. “You cannot send Minseok out there. We have a system. Luhan and Yifan first. Then it’s me. Minseok only goes out when things are desperate. He can’t take it!”

“He can,” Yixing replied. “And he will. Because I’m asking.”

“No!” Jongdae took a deep breath, attempting to reason with this flaccid royal commander. “No. Look at Minseok’s face–” Minseok flinched (“Sorry, gege, you know I don’t mean anything by it.”). “– that’s the toll of his power. Every time he uses it, it’s one more mark. And it feels like death. He  _ feels  _ every death. You don’t understand what you’re asking him to do.”

“I know exactly what I’m asking him to do.”

“Minseok is feeling  _ sick _ right now! Thanks to your bloody tunnel!” Jongdae snapped. “If you send him out there, his power will not be able to discriminate between friend and foe. He will take them  _ all _ out. You can’t ask that of his conscience!”

But Yixing merely repeated himself. “I know what I am asking him to do.”

Jongdae placed himself between Yixing and Minseok. “Just because you’re from the fucking Lotus family, I won’t let you–”

The rest of Jongdae’s words wheezed from his throat as Yixing slammed him against the rocked wall of the cave. Yixing’s head ducked down and Jongdae felt an arc of pain erupt in the flesh of his neck.

“You bit me!”

Immediately, he felt Yixing’s invasive presence in his blood, the rising fever as Yixing controlled his blood as he willed. It was nothing compared to the horror of Yifan’s induced lethargy, but the suddenness of it was enough to disorient Jongdae. Enough for Yixing to reissue his command to Minseok.

No one could do this to Jongdae.

Except someone with Royal blood.

The fucker.

Yixing lifted his head from Jongdae’s neck, teeth only slightly bloodied. “Go!” He snarled at Minseok.

A wide-eyed Minseok nodded once and stumbled out into the darkness.

Soldiers began dropping like flies.

Only when Minseok was too far away for Jongdae to bring him back did Yixing release him.

Jongdae punched his Commander in the jaw.

Hard.

Nothing debilitating. Just enough.

Despite the staggering from the blow, Yixing seemed unperturbed.

“I apologise,” Yixing inclined his head. As if Jongdae was his equal. “But you were undermining my orders and I can’t have that.” His eyes were black as the night outside. “I did what I thought would cause both of us the least harm.”

At least Yixing seemed to know that if he’d tried to distract Jongdae with his sword, Jongdae would have sliced him open before he got close.

If he tried to bite him again, though, Jongdae would take his teeth.

But there were more pressing matters at hand.

Minseok was gone too, and  _ Jongdae’s  _ men had been given no plan. Of course, they had fought greater numbers with less planning before. But this is the first time his boys have been out of Jongdae’s control.

This is the first time he’s not allowed to protect them.

He’s already lost so much.

He can’t lose them too.

“This won’t achieve anything!” Jongdae growled. “You take down this headquarters, three more will pop up here tomorrow! Please, don’t waste them like this. They’re not purebloods, but they’re good, loyal soldiers. They’ll serve you well! You don’t have to kill them for this!”

Minseok was clearly losing control. The line of falling soldiers had quickly swelled into a rapidly expanding arc of people rendered comatose– Azure and Vermillion alike. Jongdae wasn’t sure that Minseok had the wherewithal right now to ensure that any of them would wake up.

“Can I go now?” Jongdae asked, trying to keep the words from sounding like the plea they were. “Minseokie needs my help now. I need to go.”

“No.”

“What the fuck–”

But Yixing had once again addled Jongdae’s blood.

“You stay here,” Yixing’s eyes burned into Jongdae’s, even if his gaze remained cool. “You are not to come. I wanted to see what your men do. Not you.”

For a moment, Jongdae was shocked.

Then he laughed bitterly.

“It’s because you don’t trust me, isn’t it?” Jongdae felt a terrible, helpless outrage swell inside himself even as he chuckled. After all this time, it didn’t matter what he did for the Azure Empire. It didn’t matter how many lives he took. It didn’t matter how many precious things he gave to them. No matter what he did, he would never be able to make up for 2.5 litres of Vermillion blood coursing inside him.

He would always be worse than a bastard. Always half a traitor.

“What more does the Azure Empire want from me?” Jongdae spat at Yixing, even as Yixing’s powers kept him rooted to the spot. Damned lotus blood. “You already have your insurance for my loyalty. For the half Azure blood I lack, you took twice as much in recompense. Even if the others leave, I’m yours till the day I  _ die _ . What more do you want from me?”

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Yixing had no idea what Jongdae was talking about.

But there was no time to ask him. The sea of bodies around Minseok was now reaching mildly alarming proportions. Obviously Luhan and Yifan had done a fantastic job of drawing first blood from practically everyone in their way, just as Yixing had asked. But Yixing had to get moving before some soldier finally got their act together and decided to take Minseok out with a sniper.

If that happened, Yixing wouldn’t be working with the Berserkers again, he knew now.

The least Jongdae would do was gut him in his sleep.

Yixing shook his head, trying to clear his mind of that jade-carved face.

While snark could find a comfortable home there, aggression sat so uncomfortably on Jongdae’s features. Those eyes were meant to hold only the most gentle of expressions So why was the raging fire in them  _ so  _ fucking attractive.

Yixing shook himself again.

The Berserkers were truly incredible. Yixing barely had to use his sword as he ventured into what had, just moments ago, been the thick of the skirmish.

Now it was just scorched earth.

But the source of Yixing’s unimpeded path needed help, and Yixing owed him. Owed him for following Yixing’s orders at the price of his own sanity.

Minseok was on his knees in a sea of bodies, whimpering to himself and clutching his head. The previously unblemished half of his jaw was covered in marks. Tears dripped over them.

No one could come near him; Yifan and Luhan were trying, but their noses were bleeding and their legs were giving out before they could come even within ten feet of Minseok. If they kept trying, they would die. Minseok was already dying.

Yixing stepped forward, unmindful of the terrible drag of Minseok’s powers on his mind, his eyelids, his limbs. The edges of the night began swirling into itself. But his royal blood protected him from the worst.

He kept walking towards the huddled form that was the source of all this chaos.

“Stay away!” Minseok cried in panic when he realized that there was still a body left upright near him. “Please stay back!”

Had he had less respect for Minseok, Yixing’s heart would have broken a little for the Black Tortoise bastard.

But Minseok was a soldier, and he was brave, and there was no shame in what he had done. Especially since it was Yixing who had asked him to do it.

Yixing walked right up to Minseok, and when Minseok shrieked and tried to shuffle back, Yixing cupped the eldest’s face in his hands.

Abruptly, Minseok’s cries stopped.

Yixing opened up the channels of his powers.

Yixing had known Minseok was claustrophobic. He had relied on it. He couldn’t clear a hole in this front with just a few men. He needed a bomb.

He was sorry he had had to turn Minseok into one.

Yixing watched as the fresh marks receded from Minseok’s cheek. He could do nothing for the old ones, but Yixing knew that he could erase the more fresh souvenirs of Minseok’s suffering.

Royal blood was useless for many things, but this, Yixing could do.

When the wild terror finally receded from Minseok’s eyes and the Berserker seemed to return to himself, Yixing let go.

“Commander…”

“You did well, gege,” Yixing smiled. He held out a hand and Minseok took it.

“Let’s go.”

Yixing should have known that it was too easy.

The soldiers had seemed so unprepared. They were fighting at Exordium. How in hells had they allowed just three people to take out the battalion that guarded their headquarters? Even Berserkers couldn’t clear a path like that.

And where the hells were anyone’s uniforms?

Why were there no demarcations between Vermillion and Azure? Why did it feel like they were fighting a single enemy, with no friends?

Something was wrong.

Minseok screamed.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Jongdae was done waiting.

His dagger was in Minseok’s attacker’s shoulder before Jongdae had even crossed the threshold of felled men that surrounded the elder.

Jongdae didn’t bother with mercy. He singed the assailant’s nerves, right at the spine. The soldier was only partway through an unearthly howl of pain before he was dead.

But that was only one soldier.

It was like, suddenly, everyone had woken up. And they were advancing on Minseok, like his powers did nothing.

Jongdae had never seen it before. What was this? Immunity?

No, not immunity.

The first line of soldiers looked sick, and they stumbled.

But they could get closer.

And even as the marks on Minseok’s face grew darker, still the soldiers came.

They were fighting Luhan and Yifan as if they were all equally powered.

What was happening?

Jongdae threw himself into the fight, pouring his senses out into the night.

Yifan and Luhan had done well. Yixing too, Jongdae grudgingly admitted to himself as he watched his blade flash like tongues of lightning as the Commander fought with as much speed.

Good. Enough people were cut.

Jongdae reached out.

There was something wrong with the blood.

There was something wrong in these soldiers’ blood.

There was something… foreign in them. Something that was making the blood almost… hyper? Hysterical?

These soldiers’ powers were being amplified by something.

Or rather, something had removed the natural inhibitors of their powers. As Jongdae’s powers gave him a sense of the scene around him, he realized that these soldiers were not stopping where they should. That’s why they were so powerful.

And that’s why some of them were _overheating_. Jongdae _felt_ it when the soldiers used their powers past the limits of their bodies. They just _dropped_.

They were dying faster than any of the Berserkers could kill them.

Soldiers always sacrificed themselves in war, but what soldiers threw themselves to their deaths over nothing?

Surely the Berserkers were not so important that they warranted this?

Unless they had accidentally uncovered some secret.

Unless there was something here worth dying over.

Yixing and Jongdae’s eyes met as they seemed to discover one vital thing at the same time.

The tainted blood was both Vermillion  _ and _ Azure.

They were being attacked by members of both armies. Their  _ own  _ army.

Jongdae couldn’t care less.

He was also half Vermillion, half Azure.

He could take on an army that was the same.

Jongdae released his powers.

All around them, soldiers spasmed as Jongdae took hold of their nervous systems. Then he reached for the blood that fueled the nerves. He shut off its flow.

Those who had not yet been subjected to first blood were now taken by the rest of the Berserkers.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Yixing took advantage of the devastating reach and power of Jongdae’s powers to grab the soldier closest to him.

There was a cut on the soldier’s arm– easy access for Yixing.

He stiffened the blood in the soldier’s veins, locking him in place. He yanked the man forward and pried his eyes open with his fingers.

The soldier’s pupil was so large, it nearly eclipsed his iris.

This was a drug.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING, KILL THEM!”

A voice was shouting orders to the soldiers from the balcony.

A voice that Yixing knew.

Yixing couldn’t believe his eyes. But there on the balcony of the Headquarters, standing next to a general from the Vermillion army, issuing the orders to kill them, was the man who had taught Yixing how to fight with a sword.

“General Siwon…”

Somehow, over the distance and darkness between them, Yixing and General Siwon’s eyes met. 

There was only hatred in Yixing’s former teacher’s eyes.

“KILL THEM!”

Siwon retreated into the depths of the building.

And then the building exploded.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

“Jongdae, what the fuck!”

Yixing finally seemed to lose control of that normally placid countenance.

Jongdae shrugged. “I just got some of the wounded soldiers in the building to light it on fire. I didn’t realise that the structure was so weak that it would just implode like that. But all’s well that ends well, right?”

For the first time, Yixing looked like he might be scared of Jongdae. Good.

“You wanted us to get you from Point A to point B. I just exploded point B. Mission accomplished.”

“Fuck, why can’t you just follow  _ orders _ !”

Jongdae didn’t understand why Yixing looked so perturbed. What was the problem? So, the Vermillion soldiers burned in their own little oven, so what? Isn’t this what the Azure Empire wanted from Jongdae? Wasn’t his loyalty weighed by his brutality?

Yixing darted towards the building and Jongdae caught his arm.

“What are you doing?” Jongdae snapped. “I don’t care about the royal etiquette about honorable fighting. You’ll burn to a crisp in there. Just blame it on me, if your conscience can’t take it. I’m constantly on the verge of treachery, remember?”

“This is not about your  _ loyalty _ Jongdae,” Yixing snarled. “Those soldiers were  _ on  _ something. How do you think we’re going to win this war if we don’t even understand the weapons our enemies have?”

Yixing yanked his arm out of Jongdae’s.

“Think with your  _ brain _ before you act from that chip on your shoulder.”

Yixing’s eyes burned into him like coals, and Jongdae almost thought he saw a flash of orange in there. But perhaps it was just the flames.

Before he could think of a fitting reply (there was none), Yixing had run up the stairs and into the inferno.

“He’s going to die in there,” Luhan said mildly.

Jongdae let out a growl of frustration, stabbing another soldier in the gut.

“Luhan, Yifan, do you have Minseok?”

“Got him.”

“Good, keep him safe.”

Then Jongdae swore as loudly and creatively as he could.

“I’m going in.”

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Yixing could concede that this might have been a bad idea.

While the fire had not yet really reached the upper floors of the building, his lungs were already coated in ash and his eyes stung and the air sweltered.

Some soldiers were attempting to put the fire out, but Jongdae seemed to have confused them too much and most of them were just staggering around in the shimmers of heat, glazed over and uncaring.

Covering his mouth with his sleeve in a poor attempt to subdue both his coughing and his inhalation of charred things he’d rather not know about, he ran up the stairs.

He could hear the architecture around him being compromised.

It was easy to tell where the commanding officers had sequestered themselves.

There was only one room on the floor of the balcony where Yixing had seen Siwon, and it had been bolted shut. Either Siwon and the others had another escape plan, or they were planning to die with the building. Yixing didn’t care either way.

It took a single kick to ram the doors open.

Yixing stood there in the doorway, hacking black pleghm from his lungs.

Siwon was there, along with the Vermillion Commander and five other soldiers.

They all seemed to notice Yixing at once.

Then they were upon him.

“Why did you do this Siwon?” Yixing growled as he tried to draw first blood while defending his own skin from being pierced. Royals may not need first blood to fight, but the heat was rapidly sapping Yixing’s strength, and open blood would make things easier.

Siwon himself was too clever to get too close. Doped up as these soldiers were, and tired as he was, Yixing still had the power of his royal blood. The Lotus was still dangerous. "What does it feel like, being a traitor?”

Siwon grinned an ugly grin. “Why, my darling Prince. It feels like power.”

The Vermillion Commander took advantage of Yixing’s distraction. Yixing yelled as a sword sliced deeply into his right arm. Yixing’s own blade clattered to the overheated floor.

Almost immediately, Yixing’s wound started healing.

But first blood was first blood, and now he had no sword.

Yixing gasped as he felt the weight of Siwon’s power worm its way into his own blood. Yixing fought to stay upright, but Siwon was forcing him down. Siwon was forcing him to  _ bow _ .

“The time for the royals is over,” Siwon smirked. “Why should us generals fight these endless battles for you royals while you grow fat on the spoils of war? No, the royals are done. You let this war go on for too long, awaiting some blasted Dragon. Forget the Dragon. We’re taking over now. And now we have the tools to do so.”

Yixing gasped as something was flung in his face.

Ash?

No. Something else.

Yixing choked as something clouded his senses. This was the substance the others were high on. This was what was heightening their powers.

But it was doing nothing for Yixing’s powers. He just felt sick, and confused.

Siwon seemed to understand.

“Oh, it won’t do anything for you the first time around, my Prince,” he said calmly. “And after that, it gets quite addictive I’m afraid. A lot of the troops can’t live without it anymore, poor things. But we provide, and so they serve.”

“You’ve bribed them to do your bidding,” Yixing gasped, fighting the circling of his senses. He could no longer tell which way was up.

“Not bribed,” Siwon corrected. “They were tired of fighting– most of them didn’t even know why they were doing it! We just told them who the real enemy was, blew a little black powder in their faces, and they were happy to join the cause.”

Yixing saw Siwon snatch sword from the floor. Then Siwon was standing over him. Yixing’s vision was swimming.

“Incredible, no? How far the Azure royals have screwed up while waiting for their mythical dragon? But we’ll end it. We’ll give the people what they want.”

Yixing’s palms pressed against the heated wood. Splinters tore into his skin as he fought to push himself up, but he couldn’t. He groaned as he collapsed against the floor. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Siwon raise his sword.

This was it.

This was the end.

Yixing waited for the blow.

But Siwon was just standing there, with Yixing’s sword raised. Unmoving.

And then Siwon stabbed the sword into the Vermillion Commander’s gut. The Vermillion Commander died in a spewful of blood. Then Siwon killed another of the soldiers.

“No, he didn’t just suddenly become loyal,” a snide voice came from the balcony. And suddenly Jongdae was there, yanking Yixing to his feet, supporting him on his shoulder. Yixing felt his senses somewhat steady. Jongdae was soothing his nerves, Yixing realized. 

Jongdae was also controlling Siwon.

“Don’t let him throw the black powder at you,” Yixing warned absently, his thoughts moving sluggishly around the drug.

“Noted,” Jongdae said.

But Yixing hadn’t drawn first blood from Siwon, nor had anyone else. There was no access into Siwon’s blood stream. So how was Jongdae able to control him?

Only royals could use their powers against another without there being an open wound. 

And Jongdae was not Azure royalty…

Yixing watched as Jongdae flung his dagger straight into a soldier’s throat.

“That’s right,” Jongdae grunted as he adjusted Yixing’s weight to retrieve his dagger from the dead man’s gushing thorax. Siwon continued to do Jongdae’s bidding in the corner. “My beloved runaway dad was from the Phoenix family. My Vermillion half is as royal as your fancy Lotus ass.”

Yixing considered this.

“It makes sense,” he decided.

Jongdae looked surprised. “What? No screaming about my treachery? No punishment for lying to everyone but my Berserkers about my parentage?”

Ah, so that’s why Jongdae only carried a dagger… He didn’t need to cut anyone open to unleash the force of his powers…

Yixing sighed. “Why should I care? If anything is to be learnt tonight, it’s that blood is of little importance.”

Jongdae blinked at him for a second. “That’s the spirit.”

And then he grinned.

Yixing was definitely high. The curlicues of that smile were having a slightly too potent effect on him. They were surrounded by heat and smoke, Siwon was still dispatching their enemies, they were both dripping with blood and sweat, and all Yixing could think about was how the light from the flames fell so pleasingly on the panes of Jongdae’s face. These were not the bodily chemicals that were usually activated in a time of battle.

And because Jongdae was actively inhabiting Yixing’s nervous system, he could feel exactly what Yixing’s nerves and blood were doing.

“Oh?” Jongdae looked taken aback.

Yixing would have preferred to die from smoke inhalation rather than embarrassment.

But then that cheeky grin returned, even wider. And the eyes were not mocking.

“Oh, that’s interesting. We’ll have to talk later, Commander Yixing.”

Siwon followed them out onto the balcony. His limbs moved stiffly, but his eyes screamed their hatred.

“You first,” Jongdae told him politely, as if he wasn’t the one controlling Siwon’s limbs.

With a lingering stiffness that seemed to be a mark of Jongdae’s control, Siwon climbed down the rope that Jongdae had used to enter through the balcony.

“I wish we could have gone first,” Jongdae admitted as he watched Siwon climb down. “If only your man Siwon didn’t have such interesting ideas in that waxen skull of his. Then we could have just left him here to cook.”

Sweat poured down Jongdae’s face as he spoke and Yixing could feel the shorter man tremble where their bodies were pressed together. It was taking a lot of the Berserker’s energy to keep Siwon from running, and to keep Yixing upright.

But Yixing’s body was already starting to heal. His vision had ceased collapsing into itself and he was feeling more confident in his cognizance of his limbs. He straightened up, holding only onto Jongdae’s hand for support

“I saved your sword,” Jongdae pressed the hilt into Yixing’s other hand when he decided Yixing could hold it “I thought you might not want to lose it.”

“Thank you,” Yixing was glad to not lose his blade to the fire. It was a gift from his mother.

Speaking of…

“You’re really of royal blood,” Yixing murmured. Jongdae stiffened, but Yixing continued. “Your powers are incredible. You should have been on the front lines all long. Maybe we could have won by now.”

He felt Jongdae relax when he realised Yixing’s words contained no judgment.

Siwon had almost reached the ground. Luhan and Yifan were waiting for him.

“You know, I know why you burned down the orphanage.” Since Yixing was blabbering under the influence anyway, he might as well confess. “I dug into the report before I came here. I know what that orphanage was like. I know you and Minseok were once there. I know it was not good to children. Those children are better off. I’m glad you burned the place down.”

When Yixing turned his head, Jongdae was right there, eyes glinting, expression open and vulnerable in a way Yixing wasn’t sure he would get to see again.

“You burning down that orphanage doesn’t make you a traitor,” Yixing whispered, leaned in to make sure that his voice was reaching Jongdae even over the roaring of the flames. “It made you a hero. That’s why I chose the Berserkers. I couldn’t let them take you away from your team, so I offered to monitor it. That’s why I chose you. Not because I don’t trust you. I chose you because, from a single report, I knew that you are  _ good _ .”

Jongdae stared at him a moment, and Yixing wondered if he was about to be laughed at.

And then lips were pressing against his, hard.

Yixing kissed back, matching Jongdae’s bruising force, giving into this ridiculous, absurd attraction that had begun almost before he had even met the Berserker leader.

Jongdae pulled back.

“Siwon’s reached the ground,” Jongdae gasped, his lack of oxygen attributable to either the kiss or the burning building behind them. Yixing chose to believe it was the kiss. “Let’s go before we grill ourselves here.”

Jongdae looped the retrieved end of the rope around both himself and Yixing, evidently not quite trusting Yixing on his own feet just yet. Together, they stepped over the edge of the balcony.

As Jongdae lowered them down, Yixing tried not to notice how their hearts were beating in sync, chasing after each other. Clearly, he was delirious.

“Stop looking at me like that, Commander,” Jongdae said, even as his eyes remained fixed on the placement of their feet as they rappelled down the side of the building. “I’ll get the wrong idea. It’ll be hard to be  _ good _ .” Jongdae waggled his eyebrows in expressive lines.

Yixing snorted. “We still have a war to fight soldier. Don’t get distracted.”

“It seems you’re a little more distracted than I am Commander.”

Yixing couldn’t deny it. Jongdae could feel the blood in his veins after all.

But Jongdae’s blood was a bit distracted too. Yixing didn’t feel like mentioning it.

By the time they reached the ground, they were both hacking up ash and dust,

But what Siwon was spewing forth to Luhan was much, much worse.

“The War Generals of the Azure and Vermillion Empires have joined forces. We  _ proudly _ call ourselves the Traitor Army. With the black powder, we can overpower even the royals. The people are more powerful than ever, and they depend on us for the drug. The villages are already ours. And soon this whole Empire will be.”

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

“What did you just say?”

Jongdae had only felt this cold the one time he’d allowed Minseok to use his powers on him.

“You heard me,” Siwon smirked.

“You said the villages are yours,” Jongdae said urgently. “What does that  _ mean _ ?”

“It means just what I said,” Siwon replied. “It was so easy. The villagers were so affected by war, it was so easy to buy them off– black powder, a little coin, a single feather for their pillows would have been enough.”

“And for those who resisted?”

Siwon shrugged. “I let my soldiers decide.”

Jongdae lunged.

An arm grabbed him around the chest and he found himself pinned to Yixing’s torso. But Jongdae didn’t resist. He met Minseok’s gaze. They spoke together:

“We have to go home.”

  
  


❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Yixing seemed to have lost command of his troops as soon as he’d got it.

The second Siwon had been passed over to Baekhyun for safekeeping, Jongdae and Minseok were grabbing their packs and heading towards the southwestern border.

“What’s happening?” Yixing asked Luhan quietly as they followed, unwilling to address the two Berserkers heading the charge.

“It’s Jongdae’s mother,” Luhan murmured quietly, casting his voice barely above the crunch of the underbrush below their boots.

Yixing frowned. “Jongdae’s mother? Do you think she’s in danger?”

Luhan cast him a disbelieving look. “Do you really not know?”

Yixing stared at him blankly.

Something cold as the sliver of moon above glinted in Luhan’s eyes. “But you’re the one who did it.”

“Me?”

“The Azure Empire. The Azure Empire couldn’t trust Jongdae, not even when he demonstrated his prowess, not even when he could take down an army ten times the size of the Berserkers. Your Generals thought he would be swayed one day to act on the side of his father’s blood– for the Vermillions. So they took measures to  _ ensure  _ his loyalty.”

Yixing recalled the words Jongdae had flung at him back at Exordium.

__

_ “You already have your insurance for my loyalty,” _ Jongdae had said.  _ “Even if the others leave, I’m yours till the day I die. What more do you want from me?” _

Yixing was starting to dread the end of Luhan’s explanation.

“That’s right,” Luhan said grimly. “They’ve kept his mother as a hostage. She’ll be with them until either she dies or Jongdae does– to ensure Jongdae doesn’t stray like the mutt he is…”

Yixing felt horror creep up his spine. “How is he still here? How is he still fighting for us?” Yixing would have taken everything in rage for his mother. At one time, he had.

“Jongdae can’t take on the Empire,” Luhan replied. “And, Jongdae loves us. He’s here for us. That’s the sad part,” Luhan laughed sardonically. “You never needed collateral– he would do anything for us. Everything you needed to keep him was already here. This is our home.”

“It wasn’t me,” Yixing murmured, trying to ignore how the denial tasted just a little of dishonesty. Even if people kept secrets from him, he was supposed to know. It was hardly a badge of honour for the Lotus Prince to declare himself too trusting to know the truth. “This is why they didn’t want Junmyeon or me near the war,” he murmured to himself.

“What?” Luhan arched a perfect eyebrow.

“We’ve been fools this whole time,” Yixing realized. How long had their own generals been keeping the silk over their eyes? “They never let me come here. They claimed that it was for the protection of our bloodline. But that wasn’t it. They wanted me here away from here because they didn’t want me to see what was happening– what they were trying to do.”

“Well, duh,” Luhan rolled their eyes. “You’d hardly expect your enemies to announce their plans to you, do you? But now you’re here. I hope you’re planning to fix it. Because Jongdae can’t do it on his own.”

__

“I’m here,” Yixing agreed. “And I’ll fix it.”

But it turned out shortly that there were many things he could not fix.

Because by the time they got to Jongdae’s and Minseok’s village, it was burnt to ashes.

The ground was still warm beneath their feet, and the last remnants of smoke trailed lackadaisically into the night air.

“No, no no no no…”

Yixing covered his ears as a piercing wail split the night. Blood pulsed against his eardrums.

_ Jongdae _ .  _ Jongdae _ .

He wanted to reach for the man, wanted to reverse this moment, change this terrible discovery.

“Eomma!” Jongdae wailed. “ _ Eomma! _ ”

Jongdae was on his knees on the threshold of a house that was no longer anything but the scorched foundation lines. On the charcoaled floor of what once must have been its kitchen were the charred remains of a table, a stove and a woman.

Yixing didn’t want this for him. Yixing didn’t want this for anyone.

It was Yixing who had been the one to discover his mother dead.

He had only been ten, the day he found her lying on the floor with blood seeping from her throat. It was the day he learnt his place in the Palace. If he had ever thought of himself as the same as Junmyeon, the illusion– no, delusion– had been lifted that day, as he watched the blood that was half his own seep into the cracks between the floor tiles.

Nobody liked it when the head Concubine got a little too powerful.

It was Yixing’s fault.

Yixing, so earnest, so gullible, so willing to exceed. So desperate to excel that he didn’t realise that there were limits to which his excellence would be allowed.

Surpassing Junmyeon in the sword arena was not allowed.

Forgetting his station was not allowed.

Making his mother proud was not allowed.

A Concubine could be beautiful, she could be beloved, she could exist openly.

But she couldn’t be powerful, and she certainly couldn’t have a son who jeopardised the Empress’s own blood’s ascendancy to the throne.

Yixing could expand as far as he wanted, as long as he did not venture beyond the boundaries of Junmyeon’s shadow. 

Both mother and son had paid for forgetting it.

But this was not the Azure Palace.

The man weeping in front of him was not a little boy opening the bedroom door, hoping to play with his mother after his lessons, only to find her on the floor, covered in red. This did not begin with the innocent belief that  _ mu qin _ was just sleeping and end with the horror of the veil being lifted and the truth being so evident, and yet so distant. Her eyes would not open, so Yixing had held her hands, staring into the inked eyes on her palms, pretending that she was still watching over him.

Even when Junmyeon’s father– the Emperor– had arrived, Yixing had not let go of his mother’s hands. The Emperor could enact the lovelorn theatrics befitting his position and the romanticism of such loss, but Yixing didn’t have that privilege. So he just held on for as long as he could, until they finally took her away from him for good.

But this was not that. 

Jongdae was here and his mother was not, and there was no cushion of time to mute the terribleness of this fact. 

Yixing had never wanted this for anyone else. Age, class and privilege all burnt to irrelevance once the blood that had once flowed fell still.

Yixing found himself moving before he’d even decided to.

He wrapped Jongdae in his arms, rocking them back and forth. Jongdae shrieked his grief, raking his nails over Yixing’s arms that held him, sending sears of pain lancing into Yixing’s nerves as if sharing the pain might somehow reduce his own. As if such a burden could be shared. Even as his arms started to feel numb, Yixing held on, rocking them together.

“I’m so sorry,  _ qin ai de _ .”  _ My darling _ , he kissed Jongdae’s tears that were blackened by soot. “I’m so so sorry.”

Still Jongdae wailed.

Beside them, Minseok wrung his arms, unable to vocalise his pain without unleashing his powers. His eyes were darting back and forth, searching in the darkness for something that was simply not appearing. Yifan and Luhan surrounded him and keeping him warm, just as Yixing tried to do with Jongdae.

Gently, Yixing coaxes his powers into Jongdae, trying to cajole out the sedative hormones in Jongdae’s blood. Initially, Jongdae’s own Azure blood resisted, resentful of being manipulated in its grief, adamant in its pain. But slowly, it gave way, allowing Yixing to administer this small comfort. Jongdae slumped in his arms and Yixing ensconced him both in blood and body, wishing dearly that he could have protected his beloved Berserker from his own orphaned fate.

“Gege?”

At that single word, Jongdae had ripped himself from Yixing’s arms.

“Zitao!”

A tall, gangly boy had from somewhere deeper inside the village’s charred skeleton, looking like a charred skeleton himself.

Minseok was already there, holding the boy in his embrace.

Wait. Zitao…

This was Minseok’s brother… Was he also a hostage? Was this boy the collateral for Minseok’s loyalty?

Yixing wanted to rip his own blood from his skin, and fling it back at the Empire. Was this the honour they were fighting for? Was this what he lived to protect? Corruption, prejudice, treachery?

How would the dragon ever appear for them if this is what they were?

Jongdae practically wrenched the brothers apart, eyes wild and movements incoherent. Luhan and Yifan leapt forward to hold him back.

“Zitao, what happened?” Jongdae growled.

“I’m so sorry, Jongdae gege,” Zitao looked like a jade statue even covered in soot and weeping. “They were using the village to stash their black powder until they could move it. We weren’t supposed to say anything. As long as we helped them move it, acted as labour, we were protected. But two days ago, they got the green light. Apparently one of the princes left the Capital, and they were ready to move.”

The blood turned to ice in Yixing’s veins.

He had never considered it before:

He’d left Junmyeon alone.

They were all so, so confident that the dragon would come, that they would defeat their enemy, that Yixing had never considered what would happen if the enemy came from within the dragon’s Empire itself.

If Siwon had turned, if so many of their Generals had betrayed them, then who could be trusted to remain unfailingly loyal to the young Crown Prince?

The only person who shared half his blood.

“I have to go back.”

The words left Yixing’s lips unbidden. The whole group turned to him.

“Junmyeon’s in danger,” Yixing said stupidly. “I have to go.”

Whatever it was in Jongdae’s eyes that had finally opened to Yixing, now shuttered.

“You’re right,” he said bitterly. “Who cares about this little town. Who cares what happens to us? The royal family has come into danger by its own stupidity. It’s okay that we pay the price, but Dragon forbid that you feel any of its effects.”

“No, Jongdae, that’s not–”

“Go!” Jongdae screamed. “Go make your deals, go sell us out, go do whatever it is that will leave your family in comfort for the rest of your days, and leave the rest of us to rot! This is what royals  _ do _ .”

“No, Jongdae, please–”

Yixing kicked himself for speaking so carelessly, for not even trying to talk to them. They were his troops and just when they were about to accept him, he had carved out the line in their blood.  _ I have to go back _ , he had said. Not  _ we have to do something _ .

A tentative link had just been blooming and he had severed it. 

Yixing took a deep breath. “Please, Jongdae, I didn’t mean it that way,” Yixing said. “I don’t–”

Without really thinking about it, his powers reached for Jongdae, trying to appeal to him in blood as much as Yixing was trying to entreat him with words.

Another poor move.

Jongdae reacted  _ violently _ , flinging Yixing’s influence from his blood. Yixing’s breath constricted as the nerves in his lungs stopped giving his brain the signal to expand.

Jongdae was ten feet away from him, but Jongdae was choking him.

“We don’t need your platitudes, and we don’t need  _ you _ ,” Jongdae snarled. “Your bargaining chip is  _ dead _ , so now what will you manipulate me with?”

“ _ No _ ,  _ Jongdae, _ ” Yixing gasped.

But Jongdae’s powers pulled tighter around his lungs. “Go take care of your own blood. Leave mine to me.”

And Jongdae and the Berserkers left him there, sputtering over his own breath in the remnants of Jongdae’s village until Jongdae was finally too far away to affect him at all.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

“You’re an idiot,” was Baekhyun’s verdict.

They were currently sequestered in the Concubine’s quarters. Yixing was slumped on the bed while Baekhyun stood by the vanity, gazing ponderously into his reflection as he contemplated the barrage of information Yixing had laid upon him.

The relief Yixing thought he might feel in his mother’s old chambers hadn’t come. All he could see was the ashen mud that powdered Jongdae’s knees and palms as he knelt over his mother. And when that image turned red in his mind’s eye, he saw his own helpless self.

Yixing rubbed his chest. His lungs were only just starting to feel like his own. His heart, however, was still with one Berserker leader.

It seemed both those things were gone for good.

“What do I do?” It was embarrassing to feel this helpless. He wished Junmyeon was here. Junmyeon could plan. Yixing only knew how to act. “Jongdae and the Berserkers are gone– probably to exact their revenge against Siwon’s men. And I have to get a message to Junmyeon. In both cases, chances are my actions come too late,” Yixing’s fingers raked into his hair and yanked. The ensuing prickles of pain were not nearly punishment enough. “I’m such a fool, Baekhyun. How could I have missed this? I have failed everyone.  _ We’ve _ failed the Dragon. It’ll never come now. We’re going to lose everything. It’s the end of everything.”

“Oh boo hoo.”

Yixing’s head snapped up. How could Baekhyun sound so frivolous about the end of the world?

“No, it’s not,” Baekhyun said, as if he could read Yixing’s mind. At this point, Yixing wouldn’t be surprised if he could. “You found out everything in time, didn’t you?” Baekhyun pointed out. “It’s late, but it’s not  _ over _ . Not yet.”

Baekhyun knelt before Yixing, closing Yixing’s trembling fingers over the hilt of his sword. “I know that you think Junmyeon is the thinker–” Baekhyun could definitely read his mind, Yixing decided. “–but the time for thinking has passed. And you give yourself too little credit.  _ You  _ were the one who had suspicions about that particular Vermillion Empire headquarters just from reading some reports.  _ You  _ were the one who knew the Berserkers would be the best way to get to infiltrate that building.  _ You  _ discovered Siwon and the other Generals’ betrayal. Stop doubting your instincts,” Baekhyun said. “You tell me now. What do you want to do next?”

“I need to warn Junmyeon,” Yixing said immediately.

“And?”

“I need Jongdae,” Yixing whispered. “I need the Berserkers. They’re the only ones I can trust. They’re the only ones who were always on the fringes.”  _ Like me _ . “They are the last vestiges of honour for this Empire. If we stand a chance of summoning the Dragon to fix all this, I need them here.”

“Alright,” Baekhyun seemed pleased. “Now we have a plan! All we need to do is execute.”

“But I can’t be in two places at once,” Yixing retorted.

“Are there two people in this room or not?” Baekhyun said hotly. “I’ll go to Junmyeon. I’m a messenger after all, it’ll be easy for me. And it won’t be at all helpful to stop the spread of panic if the Lotus himself arbitrarily returns to the Elyxion a single day after a fight at Exordium.”

Yixing nodded. It made sense.

“Then I will go to the Berserkers. I’ll bring Jongdae back. When the Dragon comes, it will be honourable Azure Dragon soldiers who wait for him.”

“Luhan should hear you call him that,” Baekhyun snorted. “Now come, you’ve wasted enough time moping.” Baekhyun got to his feet and pulled Yixing with him. “The Dragon doesn’t like wallflowers or weeping willows. Let’s go.”

Yixing got up, but instead of leaving, he embraced Baekhyun. “Thank you, Baek,” he sighed into his friend’s shoulder. “Be safe. Don’t trust anyone– not even Donghae and Leeteuk. Tell only Junmyeon.”

“Yes, I’m not a fool,” Baekhyun patted Yixing’s shoulder condescendingly before returning the embrace in earnest. “You go bring your Berserker back.”

“Baekhyun.”

“What now?”

Yixing felt like a child, seeking reassurance for the future in his mother’s bedroom.

“There are only three days left till the Dragon is supposed to appear. What if the Dragon doesn’t come?” Yixing whispered.

Baekhyun shrugged. “Then we’ll all be dead and I don’t think we’ll care very much. Till then, let’s do our best.”

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Yixing followed a trail of ash and blood to find the Traitor Army. Four more towns had seen the same treatment as Jongdae’s home. They had set up camp (ie, taken over a town whose leadership had surrendered itself under the influence of its own addiction) about halfway between the Azure Palace and Elyxion.

Yixing had honestly expected to find the Traitor Army in flames and carnage when he finally caught up with the Berserkers.

But the Traitor Army was fine, and there was no sign of Jongdae and the others.

Something was wrong.

In the cover of the forest at the edges of the settlement, Yixing reached for his powers and felt  _ out _ .

Jongdae was here.

So were the others.

But something was wrong with their blood.

Yixing hissed as he tried to pinpoint their location. He couldn’t get an accurate reading. Something had addled their powers. Something had tainted them. The black powder.

In his focus, he lost track of the blood signals of those around him.

“Gege?”

The speaker’s back was against a tree and Yixing’s sword against his throat before Yixing could recognize who had found him.

It was Minseok’s brother. Zitao.

“Why are you always lurking?” Yixing hissed.

But the boy was so young and instantly his eyes filled with tears.

Yixing let go of him, but showed no further sympathy. “Where’s your brother? Where’s Jongdae?”

“They took them to the prison,” Zitao whispered. Yixing could feel the blood surging in the younger boy’s veins. No black powder. Just stress and fear. “Please gege. They gave my brother the black powder. You’ve seen his powers,” Zitao started to cry. “He stabbed himself to stop his powers from hurting the others. I don’t know what happened after that. There was so much blood. And when I get near the prison, I can hear Jongdae gege screaming.”

Yixing felt his hardened façade falter, before he wrenched it back in place. “Take me to them.”

“What’ll you do gege?” Zitao seemed to rightfully doubt Yixing’s first plan of just ‘barge in and get Jongdae back’.

A thought struck him.

“Do you have any friends who like the Berserkers?” Yixing asked Zitao dubiously, but a huge grin took over the younger’s face.

“All my friends are from the orphanage.”

Ah.

“They would do anything for my brother and Jongdae gege. Tell us what to do and we’re yours.”

An army of teenagers, Yixing thought to himself.

Well, wartime had asked a lot worse of a lot younger, he supposed. Besides, teenagers were certainly good at one thing–

“Do you kids know where to get some alcohol?”

Zitao’s teeth gleamed in the moonlight.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

A precocious brat named Sehun was the one to procure the alcohol.

Yixing wondered whether he should be concerned about his own ethical compass as he armed a particularly tall and gangly boy with big ears with a bottle of alcohol, a cloth wick, and a matchbox. There was still innocence in the boy’s face. Yixing hated to taint it.

He ignored the twingings of his own conscience and continued down the line: Chanyeol, Zitao, Sehun, Jongin, Kyungsoo. He made sure to remember their names. They were orphans, so no one else would.

“Remember, only hit the warehouse with the blackpowder, Light the wicks and then throw. And then run like hell, ” Yixing instructed them. “And then run away– separately. I know your instinct is to stick together and that it has worked for you so far. But if you clump together after the attack, they’ll trace you easily. Take separate paths and run until you reach the Azure Palace. Do you understand?”

The row of barely adolescent boys nodded at him.

Yixing wondered if his conscience would ever forgive him for placing them in the line of fire.

“Alright, go.”

Orphans were a hardy group of creatures, Yixing decided, as he watched the warehouse where the black-powder was temporarily being stored go up in flames. Life had not been kind, but it had obviously given them a lot of skills.

The Traitor Army soldiers were immediately distracted, running to quell the fire that was obliterating the source of their power.

While the fire blazed brighter over the warehouse, Yixing took advantage of the strident shadows it cast to run into the prison.

Luhan and Yifan were right there, slumped into each other. As Yixing rattled into their cell, they stirred. Their pupils were almost entirely black. Yixing doubted they could even see him properly. Yixing felt Yifan’s powers try to find him, try to slow down his muscles, but the Berserker’s powers sputtered like a flame tethered to a damp wick.

Yixing wondered how many doses of black-powder it took to achieve the enhanced strength of the Traitor soldiers outside. How long till they wouldn’t be able to live without it.

He shook the thought from his head.

He healed them until they were coughing a mix of black powder and bile onto the floor.

Then Yixing went one floor up.

It was easy to find the cell that held Minseok. All the inmates around him were dead.

His side was bandaged haphazardly where he had stabbed himself. After deeming the wound no longer life-threatening, Yixing ignored it. Instead, he countered the black powder in the Berserker’s system. 

Slowly, the Black Tortoise Berserker’s pupils shrank.

And then he was in tears.

“I’m so sorry,” Minseok clutched at Yixing. “I didn’t mean to, I didn’t mean to,” he sobbed into Yixing’s grey robes.

How terrible, Yixing thought as he cradled Minseok against him. To be such a soft soul with such a devastating power. But then, who else would wield it with such prudence apart from someone who felt such guilt? Perhaps there was no one better suited for such a horror of a gift.

As Minseok reeled the effects of his power back in, Yifan and Luhan approached. Yixing handed them their grief-stricken comrade.

“Where’s Jongdae?” Yixing asked Minseok gently.

“In the basement,” Minseok sobbed. “He reacted horribly to the blackpowder, worse than any of us.”

Yixing dreaded to know what was worse than Minseok’s experience.

“They didn’t anticipate what it would do to someone with half royal blood. His Vermillion side and Azure side turned against each other,” Minseok whispered into Luhan’s lapels. “I can feel them– it’s as if they’re trying to eat each other.”

So that’s what Yixing was feeling when he searched out Jongdae’s blood. Rabid chaos.

“He’s tearing himself apart. I don’t think he can survive much longer.”

Yixing was moving.

As Yixing descended into the bowels of the prison, he found himself screaming.

Yifan and Luhan followed as far as they could, Minseok a little further, before he too couldn’t take it.

Jongdae’s powers were misfiring so badly, Yixing wondered how any of them were still alive.

So Yixing screamed his pain so that he could bear it, and he pushed forward.

Jongdae was huddled in a ball in the far end of his cell.

His uniform was torn apart and his hair was undone, pulled out in clumps where his fingers dragged into his scalp. Yixing’s nerves felt like they were aglow like molten metal, and all he could feel was a terrible pain that was both real and not at the same time.

Yixing crawled the last few feet to Jongdae. He reached for the Berserker leader and Jongdae screeched,fought, tried to send him away.

Yixing knocked him out.

It should have brought relief, but it didn’t.

The outer effects of the power had stopped, but Jongdae’s blood was still warring itself. Yixing could feel it ripping his Berserker to shreds. 

And Yixing’s powers were doing nothing to heal it.

“This is because his powers are constantly fighting each other,” Minseok said sadly, finally able to approach. “Jongdae is always in pain. That’s what makes him so powerful. But the blackpowder has done something. I don’t think even your royal blood can heal him, Commander,” Minseok whispered. “I think he’s lost.”

“No,” Yixing held Jongdae to his chest, refusing to accept it. He wouldn’t lose Jongdae, least of all to his own powers “I may be unable to heal him, but I know a place that can.”

Minseok looked at him questioningly.

“I’m taking him to the source of healing. I’m taking him to the Dragon.”

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

When they reached the Azure Palace, Yixing had snuck them in and instructed the Berserkers to hide in the recesses of the Concubine’s quarters. 

Yixing carried Jongdae down to the Dragon pools himself.

He had never been so thankful for Baekhyun, who had put the fear of angering the First Empress herself if any of the soldiers so much as sneezed in the direction of the Dragon’s supposed resting place.    
  
Yixing descended into what was actually a network of tunnels rather than a single den for the Dragon. 

Sometime during the journey to the Azure Palace, the Berserker leader had awoken and now he thrashed in Yixing’s arms. Still, Yixing held on, not letting go until he and Jongdae were up to their necks in cool water.

Each bruise and cut Jongdae scratched into him, the water healed instantly.

Yixing pressed his forehead against Jongdae’s.

“Please,” he murmured. “Come back to me. Heal, Jongdae. Come back.”

Jongdae writhed and flailed and Yixing held him.

It took an hour for Jongdae to stop struggling.

Yixing was trembling from cold and his clothes weighed heavy by the time Jongdae returned to some form of coherence. Jongdae’s nails dug into Yixing’s back through his robes. He dropped his head onto Yixing’s shoulder.

“Are you back?” Yixing’s teeth chattered.

“The drug is out of my system,” Jongdae reassured. But now the Berserker was shaking harder. He held Yixing tighter. “My blood is still out of control. It hurts,” he sobbed and Yixing could feel Jongdae’s blood churn, the nerves firing off in all kinds of arbitrary ways.

“I need something to ground me– somewhere to redirect my power’s attention.” Jongdae gasped. “Hit me.”

“What?”

“You heard me! Just punch me, fight me, beat me up. It’s fine, I’m giving you permission! Just overwhelm me! You can heal the bruises after!”

Yixing felt sick.

“I can’t do that.”

“You can,” Jongdae rasped. “Just hit me. So many people have, you don’t have to feel guilty.”

“I  _ won’t do it _ ,” Yixing snarled. Precisely because so many people had done it. He wouldn’t be them. He wouldn’t be them to Jongdae.

“Please, Yixing,” Jongdae begged softly. A single tear dripped down that perfect nose. “It hurts. Please help me make it stop.”

Yixing screwed his eyes shut and clutched Jongdae to himself. “That’s just the problem,” Yixing whispered into Jongdae’s shoulder, unwilling for Jongdae to see his face when it was this unguarded. “I couldn’t hurt you even if I wanted to. I want your pain to go away. But I cannot do it by hurting you more.  _ Please _ , Jongdae. I know you must not think much of me. I know I must seem a coward in your eyes. But please, though you owe me nothing, please find another way for me to help you.  _ Please _ .”

“Oh.”

Yixing cringed at the sound of revelation in Jongdae’s voice. He could not have made himself more pathetically clearer.

Jongdae pulled back from him, holding Yixing’s face in his hands. Yixing allowed the beautiful Berserker to examine him, forcing himself to leave everything of importance naked and bare.

Whatever Jongdae was seeking from his face, he seemed to find.

Jongdae looked almost sympathetic, as if he pitied Yixing’s naive affections.

“You really like me, don’t you?” He whispered, his drug-blown pupils gazing into Yixing as if he could somehow glean the full extent of Yixing’s feelings from his eyes. He probably could.

“I can’t help it,” Yixing admitted softly. “I should have paid more attention in my poetry classes. I would have, if I’d known I could feel like this.”

“You royals are so soft,” Jongdae chuckled weakly, but Yixing knew he was not imagining the affection there.

“Jongdae please,” Yixing said, cupping the Berserker’s face, wiping his tears with wet hands. His healing powers passed through Jongdae like a sieve. The black-powder wasn’t in his system anymore, there was nothing for Yixing to expunge. This was just Jongdae’s own blood battling itself. “I’ll do anything to help you, but I won’t hurt you.”

Jongdae gazed at him, breath quickening. “Then let me try something.”

And then, just like on the balcony of the Vermillion headquarters, Jongdae was kissing him. Yixing overcame his surprise well, reciprocating fiercely. Yixing’s other hand trailed down Jongdae’s side, coming to rest at that tiny waist. He pulled Jongdae to himself, feeling the panes of the other’s body through their wet clothes and water. Jongdae’s blood still roiled, but now it was  _ slightly  _ less frenzied.

“ _ Oh _ ,” Jongdae sighed against Yixing’s lips as they parted. “Oh. This will work.”

They kissed again in a tangle of slippery limbs and wet clothes weighing them down.

Yixing was no longer cold.

“Are you sure about this?” Yixing panted as he finally pulled back. He had no doubt his feelings were clear and they could do this without Jongdae reciprocating them. But Jongdae had to at least  _ want  _ it. Yixing would rather he punched Jongdae unwillingly, than Jongdae unwillingly fuck him.

But Jongdae seemed to be entertaining no such doubts.

Before Yixing knew it, one of those delicious thighs was wrapped around him. He moaned as Jongdae ground into him, the waters of the healing pool sloshing over the sides.

“There’s not only one kind of pain, my love,” Jongdae bit at Yixing’s lip, happily drawing blood. “There’s not only one way to overwhelm.”

For a second, all Yixing could feel was his own blood, surging maniacally through his veins.

Jongdae could feel it too. He laughed, delighted.

“Not in here,” Yixing grunted, grabbing Jongdae by the hips and lifting.

“Why? Afraid you’ll scandalize the Dragon?” Jongdae cackled as he allowed Yixing to carry him to the edges of the pool. At his back, Yixing could feel Jongdae’s hands trembling, fists spasming open and closed. Jongdae was talking, but he was still hurting. Badly.

Yixing had to take it away.

“No, I’m not worried about the Dragon’s sensibilities,” Yixing growled. “But if I’m supposed to overwhelm you– ” Yixing laid Jongdae out on the rocks, positioning himself between Jongdae’s legs “– I need some leverage.” He ground down and Jongdae moaned.

The frenzy of his blood tilted, grew more organized.

Yixing grinned.

“It seems you’re more affected by me than you’d like to admit, my phoenix.”

Even in the dim light, he saw how Jongdae’s cheeks coloured. “Stop preening and fuck me,” Jongdae whined. Yixing chuckled and leaned down to oblige.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

  
  


“Next time,” Yixing licked a column up Jongdae’s throat, relishing the way Jongdae’s breath quivered beneath his tongue. Their clothes were in a wet heap in the corner, and Jongdae’s damp hair fanned out against the rock in a dark halo. “Next time, instead of on rock, I will take you on silk and velvet. Instead of blood, I’ll feed you peaches and honey.” Yixing sucked his promises into Jongdae’s neck before capturing Jongdae’s lower lip, licking across it, finally allowing the cut there to close. “Next time,” he swallowed Jongdae’s tongue. “Everyone will know what you have come to mean to me. Next time, if you let me, I’ll keep you by my side forever.”

Yixing ran his fingers across Jongdae’s chest, down his sternum, lower and lower until they brushed against Jongdae’s cock. He repeated the motion aiding the rush of blood downwards, knowing that he was magnifying every sensation that Jongdae was feeling. The breath rattled out of Jongdae. His thighs trembled, squeezing together, as if trying to close or trying to trap Yixing inside himself. 

Yixing repeated the motion a third time. This time, he pulled the blood all the way down until he grasped Jongdae’s cock. He explored its length, thumbing gently at the slit before he allowed his powers to unleash a gentle havoc, magnifying the sensitivity of the flesh.

Jongdae shrieked and it was music to Yixing’s ears.

He repeated the motion, grasping Jongdae’s length tightly between their bodies even as his own cock drove relentlessly into the heat of his phoenix.

“Yixing, please!” Jongdae sobbed, squirming in his arms, thrashing uncontrollably, nails raking down the panes of Yixing’s back

Yixing gasped as Jongdae lit his nerves afire. As much as he was inside Jongdae’s body, he could feel Jongdae inside him, in his blood.

It had never felt like this for him. He was drowning in Jongdae and he didn’t even know if the other knew it.

Before he could succumb to the sensations Jongdae was raking into his flesh, Yixing pulled back, dragging Jongdae’s body down so they would remain joined even as Yixing sat back on his haunches. Jongdae gasped as his thighs fell open and Yixing took the opportunity to grasp the inviting flesh and  _ pull _ , slamming Jongdae’s body onto his cock. Jongdae arched, face contorted in shocked pleasure, breath hiccupping as Yixing refused to give him a break. Yixing squeezed his eyes shut, forcing his own blood to regulate itself so he could eke every last moan of his lover’s pleasure.

“It’s so much,” Jongdae babbled even as he planted his heels against the slippery rock so that he could rock forward to meet Yixing’s pace, thrust for thrust, his body opening itself up to welcome the promises Yixing made with each undulation of his hips.

“Hmm,” Yixing hummed noncommittally, making no secret of where he was looking, eyes trained on where his cock was disappearing into Jongdae’s body.

He stroked the swollen flesh of Jongdae’s rim, gently thumbing at the edge of the pucker that fluttered beneath his touch, pulling the blood to make it blush that little bit more. He imagined what it might feel like to put his tongue there, to lick inside alongside his fingers. This would also have to be a matter for another time. He gave the rim a slight tug, and then dipped the very tip of his thumb  _ in _ .

Jongdae clenched down with such force that Yixing had to bite his own tongue to keep himself from coming right there.

__

He muffled a groan

“Son of a dragon,” Jongdae cursed. Throwing an arm around Yixing’s neck, he dragged Yixing’s mouth down to his. “Two can play this game.”

Yixing moaned as Jongdae’s tongue battled his, swiping against the cut where Yixing had bitten himself. Suddenly, all the nerve endings of Yixing’s mouth and tongue blossomed into livewires. Jongdae’s firm grip stopped Yixing from pulling away from the overwhelming sensation while the fingers of his other hand dragged up from the dip of Yixing’s tailbone right until the base of his skull, turning his spine to honey.

For the first time in his life, Yixing used his powers to stop his own orgasm.

Jongdae choked a little as Yixing’s thrust aborted itself halfway inside him, but he didn’t look the least bit contrite.

Yixing had no choice but to take his own revenge.

“Please, Yixing! It’s too much! Please, please!”

Yixing pressed his thumb in harder, trying valiantly to ignore the way it was brushing against his own cock, the way Jongdae’s walls were squeezing too tight around him.

He looked up in time to see Jongdae’s eyes roll up in pleasure.

Jongdae keened, heels pressed into the small of Yixing’s back, and then he was coming.

Yixing worked him through it, laying small devoted little kisses along the Berserker’s neck.

He pulled his hand away and pressed it low against the flesh of Jongdae’s belly, doing nothing more than allowing his beloved’s blood to feel Yixing’s presence as it pulsed through his body.

The low moan that escaped Jongdae’s mouth was so satisfied that Yixing couldn’t help the way his hips bucked, driving hard into Jongdae’s body.

Jongdae yelped.

“I’m sorry!” Yixing rushed to pull out.

“No!” Jongdae cried, locking his ankles around Yixing’s torso. “No. You’ll stay, my dragon,” Jongdae yanked Yixing down and licked across the seam of his lips. “You’ll stay until you get what you gave me. If you’ve read everything about me, then you know I don’t do anything by halves.”

Yixing knew.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

It took three ebbs and climaxes until Yixing felt Jongdae’s blood finally resume its normal operations.

They were exhausted and the one torch that lit the pool was nearly burnt out.

Jongdae traced patterns along Yixing’s chest, teasing the nerves of his nipple. Yixing would half-heartedly swat him away, and then Jongdae would resume.

“I’m sorry, Jongdae,” Yixing murmured after a while.

Jongdae chuckled, but sadness and exhaustion stained his laughter. “I would say you’re forgiven.”

“We’re in trouble,” Yixing gazed at the cragged ceiling of the cave. In just over twenty-four hours, the Dragon was supposed to pass through here. If there was anything left of the Azure Empire that it would seek to honour. “I’ve sent Baekhyun to Junmyeon, but I have no idea whether that will help. I can’t say I know who our friends at the Palace are anymore. Maybe I’ve just sent Baekhyun to die by Junmyeon’s side.”

Yixing said the words dispassionately, as if he wasn’t talking about the people who formed his whole world.

He wondered if the Vermillion Bird would appear instead. But if the Vermillion Soldiers, too, had rotted inside, then surely their god would turn its back as well?

Would the gods ever forgive them?

His thoughts were interrupted by Jongdae’s very unclothed form rolling on top of him. His cheeks were palmed between cool hands. Yixing reveled in the ease of Jongdae’s movement, enjoying the Berserker’s clear irises and even pulse. He indulged himself, trailing his hands lightly to follow the lines of Jongdae’s body.

Jongdae was looking at him, gazing into him as if in search of something. He seemed to find it.

“I will go to Junmyeon.”

Yixing frowned. “What?”

Jongdae smoothed Yixing’s brow with a twang of a nerve.

“You are worried about your brother,” Jongdae said softly, now running his fingers through Yixing’s hair. “I know what it is to be helpless to protect a loved one.”

Yixing tightened his grip on Jongdae, but Jongdae ignored his sympathy.

“I also know that, if the Dragon is to appear at all, you must stay here,” Jongdae was looking somewhere above him, fingers still tangled in Yixing’s hair. “Keep the Berserkers here, with you. Pure or not, they are a hundred times more honourable than your old commanders, and they will serve you well. You’ve done the impossible– you’ve earned their respect,” Jongdae smiled gently.

“Only because I saved you.”

“Yes,” Jongdae agreed. “Others wouldn’t have. You did. You are special, Lotus. Even in my irritation at being supplanted, I could see that,” Jongdae grinned. “You are a good man, and more importantly, you treat us as if  _ we _ are good men. It will not trouble us to stand by you, nor to die by your side.”

Yixing buried his face in Jongdae’s shoulder. “Don’t die by my side. Don’t die at all.”

Jongdae’s loud laughter rang like phoenix song in Yixing’s ears.

“Don’t leave,” Yixing begged suddenly, knowing how the words themselves betrayed Junmyeon.

“Rubbish.” But Jongdae refused to let Yixing besmirch his own honour even in sentimental farce.

“Jongdae,” Yixing pleaded, unsure of what he was even asking for. This was war. There were no concessions for newfound love.

“Yixing,” Jongdae said firmly. “Who is the best soldier at your disposal right now?”

“You.”

“The most powerful fighter?”

“You.”

“Who can you trust to protect your brother?”

“All of you.”

Jongdae’s ensuing smile was like a beacon of light in the darkness. “Thank you. For saying that. But I will go, and I will protect your brother. And you will protect my family in turn, just as they will protect you.”

Yixing enveloped Jongdae in his arms, praying to all the gods and his beloved mother that this one last good thing would return to him when the fight was over.

“Now, until I have to leave Dragon…” Jongdae nipped at Yixing’s throat. “Fuck me again? Not because you’re trying to save my life. Fuck me again. This time, show me how you feel.”

So Yixing did.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

A few hours later, Yixing was reluctantly parting from Jongdae. 

He didn’t know by what trick or farce or magic Jongdae had taken over his heart like this (or perhaps it was simply the urgency borne of imminent death), but when Jongdae left, Yixing was searingly aware that he was letting go of something that had become dangerously precious.

But the Dragon awaited and his Berserker had to make sure that Junmyeon came home.

“What’s the plan, boss?” Luhan asked as Yixing and Yifan pored over the maps they had unfurled across the Concubine Quarters’ floor.

“They’re going to send half of their men to Elyxion and the other half will come here for us.” A quick scouting trip to the top of the mountain had revealed the Traitor Army’s strategy. Not that they were trying to hide anything. The Traitor Army was behaving as though it had already won.

Yixing understood what would happen next. “They don’t expect the Dragon to come, but taking over the Azure Palace, killing me, killing Junmyeon– there is no better power than symbolism in bloodshed.”

“They’ll manipulate everyone with a bloodgift,” Minseok said slowly.

“And that’s how they’ll rebuild,” Yixing said grimly. “A hollow Empire, built on a black pit of suffering and sickness. Those in power will get fatter and those beneath them will learn to eat themselves.”

“So not unlike most Empires,” Luhan quipped.

“You know it’s not the same,” Yixing said.

“I know.”

“What do we do?” Minseok asked. Yixing could appreciate the trepidation in his voice. How could they go up against an enemy that had planned this long? Under all of their noses?

“Jongdae will bring Junmyeon here,” Yixing said. “With both the Princes here, and with all of you, we’re hoping that the Dragon will emerge and purge our enemy.”

“And if not?”

“If not, we take as many down before we go.”

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Yixing dressed in all black to honour his Berserkers. They would live as equals, and if they were to die, they would die as equals too.

Zitao’s network of orphans were placed strategically along the outer walls of the Palace, keeping count of the enemy that was rapidly approaching.

Yixing was going over the final plan with Luhan when they heard it.

Not marching, and not the sound of drums.

No, it was a song. A folk song, sung only in Elyxion.

Yixing’s heart sank. He knew what it meant. Elyxion had fallen. It was not half the Traitor Army that was visiting them: the whole lot were at their doorstep.

Zitao came running from the ramparts. “Gege, there’s a small delegation at the front. They’re demanding to speak with you–”

“You can’t let them in!” Luhan hissed at Yixing.

“Use the side door,” Yixing growled at Zitao. “Let them in, and then you and the other boys leave through the tunnels.”

Zitao scurried off.

“You can’t be serious!” Luhan snapped.

“I have to know what they want,” Yixing said. “They’re taunting me. I want to know why.” 

The delegation of Traitor Army soldiers was small, and no tricks were tried as they entered the Palace. The soldiers probably knew they didn’t need them. If Zitao’s estimate of the troops outside was right, the Berserkers and Yixing were sorely outnumbered.

There were about eight soldiers, two at the front and the rest trailing behind. It wasn’t the soldiers themselves that caught Yixing’s eye: it was what they held. They were carrying something on a board on their backs. A person.

The delegation stepped into moonlight and Yixing recognized the pale form being paraded towards him. Tragedy stopped time.

“No.”

Jongdae’s head lolled lifelessly, his arms limp, a thin trickle of blood trailing from the corner of his mouth.

Beside him, Luhan was screaming. Yifan was holding onto Minseok, trying to calm him as his despair threatened to let loose his powers.

“Siwon.”

It was only when Yixing saw the old War General at the front that he realized the terrible betrayal that had just taken place. Because Siwon had been captured by them. Siwon should have been shackled in the dungeons of the Palace. Siwon shouldn’t have been here,

Yixing felt his heart plummet.

“Oh Gods.”

Yixing finally saw

There, bearing Jongdae’s lifeless body to the ground, at the very front of the procession, where Yixing had not seen him because he hadn’t wanted to, was Baekhyun.

“Baekhyun, no,” Yixing whispered. “What have you done?”

Baekhyun tried to look contrite, but missed the mark by several facial expressions.

Eventually, he just shrugged. “What was I supposed to do? We’ve been fighting this war too long on the behalf of the royals, and for what? I’ve lived in this abandoned Palace my entire life. You moved on, Junmyeon-ge, everyone moved on. But me. Have you thought about what it was like to be left behind like that? By those I considered my closest friends– my family, the people I grew up with?”

Yixing had never thought about it. He just assumed that Baekhyun, like all of them, would adapt. But he hadn’t realized that adapting had only been asked of him, but expected of Baekhyun.

“One day, all of you were gone,” Baekhyun continued. “And that’s when I realized. You may greet me with smiles and proclamations of brotherhood, Xing-ge. But when it comes to it, we have differences no? My loneliness is allowed, my death is allowed, my suffering is allowed in a way that yours will never be. Because you are a Royal, and because you have a bloodgift. And I couldn’t stand that.”

Yixing watched his childhood best friend’s face twist into an expression that was beyond recognition– malice and hate and seething vengeance combined.

“And then, of course, there’s this,” Baekhyun toed Jongdae’s body on the ground. “I liked Jongdae well enough, believe me. It’s just sad that he’s still so enthralled by you royals– I thought the Berserker would be better than that.”

__

“What did you do to him?” Yixing breathed.

“Bullet with black powder,” Baekhyun said with something like awe tinging his voice. Yixing felt sick. “His body didn’t even have a chance to heal itself. Of course, he did try to take some of us out, especially with his powers enhanced like that. But we didn’t need to be close to fire the gun. So. There you go.”

Baekhyun gestured to the lifeless body at his feet and stepped back.

Yixing darted forward and scooped Jongdae off the ground. He thrust the limp body at Minseok. “Take him to the pools, go!” he barked when Minseok tried to protest. Yixing raised his sword, waiting for Siwon and Baekhyun to try and stop them.

But Baekhyun let the two Berserkers go.

“Minseok gege can take him,” Baekhyun said. “He’s dead, there’s nothing the pools can do for him.”

Baekhyun smiled softly and the expression was so recognizable that Yixing felt his heart being cleaved in two. He didn’t realise he was crying until a despondent tear dripped off his chin.

“Baekhyun, we could have made everything better if you’d just told me,” Yixing whispered. “All you had to do was ask. We’re not what you think we are.”

“No, you’re incompetent,” Baekhyun said easily. “Not like your father. But that doesn’t mean that you won’t become him. Look what he had done to your mother? He gave the order and then he comes weeping in the Concubine’s Quarters as if someone’s cut off his limb, what an incredible act that was!”

Yixing blinked.

“No. He loved her.”

“Believe what you will, I was there when he gave the order.”

Yixing’s life was crumbling around him. In his mind, that fateful day replayed, the blood on the tiles, the eyes on her hands, the Emperor’s shuddering, weeping shoulders,

“I told you, you’re incompetent,” Baekhyun’s gaze tore into Yixing. “But your father was something else altogether. We can’t have you become him. And if you  _ don’t _ become him, we still can’t have someone so naïve, so foolish on the throne. Either way, Yixing-ge, this is the end. Unless you would join us?” Baekhyun tilted his head teasingly.

“Never,” Yixing snarled. “I’ll defend the Palace myself if I have to, but I will never turn traitor.”

“So be it,” Baekhyun nodded at Siwon. “Tell them to open the gates. The Azure Palace is ours.”

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

  
  


The gate shattered open. Yixing could hear the thundering of soldiers’ boots, the clanging of their spears. He knew if he turned, he would see them flooding the pavilion.

His phoenix was dead, and it was likely that Junmyeon was too.

It was already midnight. The moon was an orb in the sky.

The anniversary of the world was upon them.

The Dragon hadn’t come

Everything was lost.

Yixing was alone.

There was no one else around him. The Berserkers were either dead or assisting the dead.

The enemies around him were singing the songs of Elyxion, mocking him with their conquest of his hometown.

This was the end.

Yixing allowed his grief to attenuate to a fine edge. Then he wielded it with his blade.

He reached into the blood of the first ring of opponents and  _ yanked _ . A circle of soldiers keeled forward, dead in an instant. The next soldiers to approach him, he dispatched with his blade.

Yixing could not rectify this great aberration that had occurred in the history of the four Empires, but he could avenge his fallen brothers. He could mourn his beloved phoenix while covered in his enemies’ blood.

Yixing finally understood why it was that he’d always felt so at home with the Berserkers. The abyss of grief, betrayal and hatred unwound from his heart, twisting itself into a developed, cultivated sort of rage, its end whittled down to a keen stabbing point.

For the first time in his life, Yixing showed no mercy. The world descended into shades of black, white and grey, and he was splattering it in red.

But rage– even the rage of a royal– wasn’t enough to stave off an army of five hundred soldiers.

Yixing soon found himself back on the steps of the Azure Palace, edging backwards as the onslaught of the Traitor army arced around him. Growling, Yixing reached into another row of soldiers and addled their guts. They went down a burst of blood. A hundred more seemed to replace them.

A dagger lanced to the sky, piercing the soft flesh of Yixing’s opponent’s neck.

Yixing turned around in a burst of hope.

But it was Luhan.

Yifan and Minseok followed close behind him. Minseok shook his head minutely. Jongdae was lost.

“Did you leave him there?” Yixing demanded. “Then maybe the waters can take more time to work!”

Yixing ignored the look of sympathetic pity on Luhan’s face.

“What are they doing here?” Yixing asked spying the small entourage that followed the Berserkers; Zitao and the orphans.

Luhan shrugged, retrieving his dagger out of someone’s skull. “They wanted to help.”

“What’s the plan?” Yifan asked.

“You need to go.”

Luhan paused in the middle of gutting someone to stare at Yixing. “What?”

“Go,” Yixing said determinedly. “The Dragon isn’t coming– this Palace is now nothing more than a symbol of something that once was. It doesn’t need protection– the townspeople do.  _ Go _ . Get out through the back of the Palace. The people need you.”

Luhan swore. But then he nodded. Like shadows, the Berserkers disappeared up the stairs, the bloodied bodies the only indication that they (Luhan) had been there at all.

“How noble,” Siwon emerged from the ranks of his Traitors. “It won’t do you any good. The people are mine. And now you have lost any chance at saving yourself.”

But Yixing felt no desire to save himself. He wanted vengeance.

Yixing drew the night air into himself, letting his lungs expand. His shoulders straightened, his eyes closed, his arms folded. He pulled his focus to a point.

“Still praying to your false god?” Siwon cackled distantly.

Yixing opened his eyes.

He drew his hands apart.

Siwon’s neck snapped.

Yixing didn’t give the other Traitor troops a chance to react. Yixing twisted his arms, ready to attack again.

“Yixing gege, here!” And Baekhyun sounded so earnest that Yixing turned.

A sack of black powder exploded in his face.

Yixing hissed, shaking the powder from his eyes. But it was too late. He was seeing shadows. Yixing blinked, but the shadows didn’t leave. 

They transformed, took on corporeal form.

The first shadow walked up to him.

“Jongdae,” Yixing whispered, as the phantom of his phoenix appeared before his eyes. “I’m sorry,  _ qin ai de _ . I love you.”

Jongdae sneered and his eyes turned different colours. “If you loved me, Yixing, you wouldn’t be so  _ weak _ .”

“No, Jongdae, I–”

Yixing could no longer distinguish the shades from his enemies.

“Save your excuses,” Jongdae smirked, and his eyes turned completely black. “After all, I’m not the one you have to apologise to.”

And now a second shadow was taking form.

“ _ Muqin _ .” Mother.

“How disappointing,” Yixing’s mother’s red veil fluttered with her words. She appeared to him as she was when he was ten. Beautiful and devastating. “I thought I had raised a son worthy of defending the Empire. Instead, you are this.” The eyes on her palms mocked him before he felt her grab his face. “You are nothing.”

When she stepped back, Yixing was crying.

The third shadow took on Junmyeon’s handsome features.

“Junmyeon,” Yixing supplicated, not wanting to hear what this cruel shadow of his brother would say. But he was not spared.

“My father killed your mother because he thought you could challenge me,” Junmyeon laughed. “You got her killed!” He threw his head back and howled. Yixing fell to his knees. “All for nothing.”

“All for nothing,” Yixing whispered to himself.

A hand lifted his chin. Yixing stared into Junmyeon’s black eyes.

“I knew, you know,” Junmyeon sneered. “I knew everything. And I watched you flounder. Pathetic. As if you could ever consider yourself my equal. As if you were ever my brother.”

Yixing flinched.

To hear those words confirmed Yixing’s worst fears.

Which is exactly why Yixing knew they weren’t true.

Because Jongdae might not love him. His mother might be disappointed in him. These were possibilities– the very worst of their kind, but possibilities nonetheless.

But there was no world in which Junmyeon disowned him as a brother.

Never.

Yixing felt for the black powder in his bloodstream. But he didn’t extract it. He embraced it.

When Yixing opened his eyes, the shadows were still there. And now they looked just like him. They moved just like him. He was in control.

With the black powder no longer hindering his mind, it enhanced his powers. He was going to end this.

He reached out to the troops of the Traitor army. He could feel every lick of adrenaline, every throb of fear running through their bloodstreams. It was overwhelming, but still Yixing held on. And then he pulled that sensation into himself, feeling their hearts pulse in the pounding of his own blood.

And then Yixing set about killing himself.

With a flick of his right arm, Yixing had broken it. Screams erupted in the pavilion as every Traitor soldier felt their bones splinter.

Another twist. Yixing’s femur.

Another round of screams from the Traitor army.

Yixing fell to the ground, gasping in pain. But it wasn’t enough. The black powder would keep the troops going, even in agony. Even as Yixing watched, some of them were getting up, dragging their spears and broken limbs towards him. He stabbed one in the calf and then the jugular as he fell, but not before the man managed to get his knife between Yixing’s ribs.

The man collapsed as he felt the sinew in his own side part.

Yixing spat blood onto the stone. He staggered to his feet, putting all his weight on his right leg. Blood matted his uniform, dripped from his hair, flowed from his fingertips.

His eyes searched, his power seeking out the person he most wanted to see at that moment.

But he couldn’t feel Baekhyun.

No matter.

He would take everyone else down instead. They would never hurt his people again. This would end once and for all.

Yixing stopped his own heart.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

A second stretched to eternity.

It was like watching the world in slow motion.

It was strange to stop one’s own heart, Yixing thought idly. He was still breathing. He could still think. He could still feel. He could still miss Junmyeon, Jongdae, his mother.

But there was no oxygen reaching his blood.

Everyone’s blood was still.

It was like all their eyes were glassy windows, holding the last glimmers of life. Spears fell, limbs collapsed, people crumpled to the ground like paper puppets.

Black was bleeding in at the edges of his vision. This was the end, truly. The sensation of holding his own heart still was akin to trying to suffocate oneself in plain air, Yixing thought. The body protested.  _ Life is right there! _ It seemed to scream at him. But this was the only way to take them all down.

The world faded.

Still, Yixing held all their blood still. If he had to defy death for a single moment just to make sure they died first, he would.

What a strange sight it must be, he thought, a whole pavilion of soldiers, all dying at once.

And then, Yixing finally felt it, creeping along his limbs, cold and numb, but welcome:

Peace.

He released himself into it.

And then it was gone.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

Yixing gasped as his heart began pumping again, fluttering frantically to make up for the precious seconds it had lost.

The bones of his arm and leg were already knitting themselves back together.

Around him, the Traitor army was groaning. They were alive.

No.

Yixing reached for the soldiers with his powers again, and got nothing. It was as if he was being blocked, unable to access them.

What had happened? Had the black powder worn off? Had Yixing been weak, even until the end?

_ I’m so sorry, Jongdae _ .

But there was something else too. Something strange was in the air. Yixing felt a gust of wind when not a hair stirred. He was feeling the odd sensation of being on the ground and simultaneously floating. There was a faint crackle in the air, as if it was charged with electricity.

And then Yixing realized that the Traitor army was looking at something.

They were not attacking him, they were not even taking up arms. Most of them were falling to their knees.

Yixing frowned.

They were all staring up, somewhere at the sky  _ above _ the Palace?

_ Why don’t you turn and see for yourself, _ a voice boomed in Yixing’s head.

Yixing turned around.

And there, curling around the shape of the moon was not an Azure Dragon, nor was it a Vermillion Bird.

It was a Black Dragon.

Yixing did not know this god.

_ Two royal princes, dying for peace _ , the Black Dragon sounded so amused in Yixing’s head.  _ How could I not appear? _

__

The Black Dragon undulated in the sky.

_ The gods were always good at starting these wars, _ the Black Dragon mused.  _ And I must always end them _ .

Suddenly, Yixing recognized the deity in the sky for who she really was.

The gods had not appeared for Yixing.

The First Empress had.

_ Good boy. You learn fast. _

The soldiers were on their knees, trying to worship her, but it was too late. Burning gold adorned her face and horns, and she had come for them.

She rent the ground in two.

Yixing watched as jaws gnashed and fire seared and claws slashed.

But he couldn’t let the First Empress waste her efforts here when there was so much more at stake.

“Wait!” he cried, even as she feasted on a morsel of Traitor soldier. “Wait!”

She turned to him with those blazing eyes and bloody teeth, but Yixing held his ground. The air seemed to part as she wound her way towards him, as if the elements themselves were shifting to accommodate her will. Yixing could sense the vastness of the presence that lay behind that gold and black reptilian armour, but in many ways it was like staring at the ocean, its vastness beautiful to behold, but never really to be understood.

Yixing refused to let himself tremble as he gazed into those fiery eyes.

“Please, First Empress,” Yixing said softly. “Don’t save me. Please save the towns.”

The First Empress turned her head this way, then that, her vast pupil raking over his form, studying him. Her lips curled, and her teeth were bared.

She was grinning.

_ Fine. But once you let me go, know that I will not come back for you. I only have one night on this earth to roam freely, and I intend to make the most of it! _

__

Yixing bowed. “Thank you.”

She eyed him a moment longer.

_ You are a strange one. The other one told me I would find you so. I’m glad he was right. _

Who?

But she didn’t answer, and Yixing watched as the great Black Dragon turned her sight upwards and disappeared into the clouds.

“You sent her away.”

Yixing turned, simply watching as Baekhyun sauntered towards him. There was blood smeared across his face, but it wasn’t his. Yixing could tell. Baekhyun had orchestrated everything, but not a drop of his own blood had been spilt.

Yixing raised his arms, but his hands were shaking. Somehow, despite everything, he couldn’t find it in himself to hurt Baekhyun, even after everything.

“Until the end, Yixing-ge,” Baekhyun whispered. “You are so foolish.”

He raised the gun that had shot Jongdae. His fingers flexed on the trigger.

And then Baekhyun’s fingers spasmed, and the gun slipped from his fingertips.

Baekhyun fell to the ground, a dagger in his back.

It took a moment for Yixing to recognize the hilt.

Yixing didn’t dare to–

“Look up, beloved Dragon.”

Yixing’s breath shuddered out of him.

Standing there, his uniform in tatters, but his eyes gleaming and his body and blood whole, was his phoenix.

“Jongdae,” Yixing whispered. _ Two royal princes, dying for peace _ , the Black Dragon had said. 

The First Empress had brought him back.

Jongdae smiled and amongst that scenery of blood and smear and smoke, not even the moon could have been more beautiful.

On the ground, Baekhyun moaned. Immediately, Yixing flung himself beside his former friend, pulling Jongdae’s dagger from his shoulder blade. Without even a thought of hesitation, Yixing began to heal Baekhyun.

“No!” Baekhyun rasped. “Let me die! I won’t rot in one of your filthy prisons!”

Yixing ignored him, feeling bone and sinew stitch themselves back together.

The second Baekhyun was healed, he lunged at Yixing. But this time, it was not hatred that Yixing saw in Baekhyun’s eyes, but fear. Yixing moved aside and then Baekhyun was falling again, like a puppet with its strings cut. Jongdae kept his hand outstretched, holding Baekhyun immobile.

“It’s alright, my phoenix, you can let him go,” Yixing assured Jongdae.

Jongdae looked at Yixing askance for a moment, but then he obeyed. He let Baekhyun go. This time, Baekhyun remained still.

“Now what?” Baekhyun asked bitterly. “If you won’t kill me, which prison will you send me to? In which dark cave will I spend my eternity?”

“Nowhere. I’m not sending you to prison.”

Baekhyun’s eyes widened.

“I can’t,” Yixing admitted. “Perhaps it’s weakness, just as you said. But I find I cannot fault you for hating a system that was broken. But I can’t let go of what you did.”

“You are at an impasse,” Baekhyun said.

“No,” Yixing disagreed. “I have decided. Baekhyun, you retain your freedom, but you are exiled. You are no longer welcome in the lands of either the Azure Empire, nor the Vermillion one. You will have to find a new home.”

“What if I raise an army and come back to fight you?”

“Do what you must.” It was Jongdae who spoke. “We have won and Yixing has spared you. Come back for us and we will win again. And, next time we meet, I  _ promise _ I will take my revenge for that bullet you put in me.”

Baekhyun looked between Jongdae and Yixing, his face inscrutable. And then he was running towards the tunnels that led back to the mountain. Yixing had no doubt that, by dawn, Baekhyun would be far, far away. It was a thought to be reckoned with later.

“Thank you, Jongdae,” Yixing’s eyes fell on his resurrected beloved once again. “Thank you for your mercy.”

Jongdae’s canines glinted. “I have a flawed family too, and you protected them. I could give yours this one pass.”

Yixing just hoped that the choice that they had made wouldn’t come back to bite them.

“Are you ready to end this?”

Around them, the last of the soldiers who hadn’t fled or died by the Black Dragon were regrouping. They were preparing to mount one last attack.

Yixing picked up his sword and Jongdae picked up his dagger. They stood, the wings of their backs pressed against each other’s. The enemy surrounded them. The Dragon and the Phoenix shifted, readying themselves for one final fight.

“Together?” Jongdae asked, grinning over his shoulder.

“Together,” Yixing affirmed.

This time, Yixing knew, there was no chance he would lose.

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

In the end, a sea of blood and dead soldiers washed across the Palace, and Yixing and Jongdae lay at the top of the stairs, under the moon. Jongdae was sprawled on his back and Yixing’s head rested on his chest, reveling in the steady thumping of Jongdae’s heart.

“Yixing! Yixing!”

And then Junmyeon was there, his face replacing the stars. Yixing found himself pulled into an embrace so tight, it was almost painful. He returned it happily. Junmyeon told them how the Black Dragon had arrived, how their enemies had surrendered almost immediately, how the Vermillion Leader had come to him and parlayed peace.

“You saved us,” Junmyeon said and Jongdae, who became so uncomfortable at being thanked so earnestly that he sidled closer to Yixing’s shoulder. Yixing curled his fingers over Jongdae’s.

“Commander!”

The Berserkers had arrived. They crowded around Yixing and Jongdae, and Yixing tried to hide his amusement at how nervous Junmyeon looked, especially when the tall Yifan seemed to take a liking to him. Minseok curled around Jongdae like a cat, and Jongdae held him close until some of the newer marks faded from Minseok’s face. And then the orphans returned, creeping around them like timid, but affectionate forest animals.

Before long, the sun was rising over the horizon.

“Will you go back to Elyxion now?” Yixing asked Junmyeon as the first rays of light illuminated the massacre on the ground. Yixing suspected that one day, what he had done here might horrify him. But, for now, he would keep his victory untainted.

“No,” Junmyeon replied. Yixing eyed him in surprise.

“I’m not going back,” Junmyeon said. “I’m staying here, which is where I was supposed to be all along. We have to rebuild trust in this Empire. We practically have to lay every stone from the foundation up.”

“You can do it,” Yixing said steadfastly.

“No,” Junmyeon shook his head again. “ _ We  _ will do it. You and I, and them,” Junmyeon gestured to the Berserkers. “And many of those born without the bloodgift who have been neglected for too long.”

Yixing frowned. “All of us?” It was unheard of, people outside of pure royal lineage having a say in government.

“All of us,” Junmyeon said. “So get some good rest, Xing, because after this, you’re going to be very busy for a long time.” He waggled his eyebrows in a most un-royal manner.

Yixing snorted, watching fondly as Junmyeon walked away, only to be accosted by Yifan trying to engage him in conversation about his daggers.

“A month’s salary says that they’ll be fucking within the month.” A hand wound around Yixing’s waist and cupped his ass.

Yixing chortled, turning into the embrace to do some not-so-subtle groping of his own. “Royals don’t have a salary, so you’re on your own for that one. Will you stay?” Yixing ran his nose along the cut-plane of Jongdae’s cheek, relishing the small shudder he received in response.

“I will,” Jongdae captured Yixing’s lips as they coasted by. “And the boys will too. This is our home.”

“Our home,” Yixing agreed. “I promised you, didn’t I? That I’ll keep you by my side forever.”

“Speaking of which,” Jongdae’s arms draped around Yixing’s neck, his fingers tangling into his hair. “I recall you saying something about next time being on silk and velvet.” Jongdae’s breath fanned across Yixing’s lips. “Will you keep that promise too, my Dragon?”

“Beloved phoenix,” Yixing’s grip on the lithe body in front of him tightened. “May I show you your new bedroom at the Palace?”   
  


FIN

❀━────━▒ ۞ ▒━────━❀

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry! I didn't see the Baekhyun thing coming either, it just happened!  
> I hope you enjoyed and if you feel like it, kudos and comments are always appreciated!


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